Manchester City fans who follow our coverage of the Chilean media are probably aware of how big Claudio Bravo is in his home country.
Even though the national team has big stars such as Arturo Vidal and Alexis Sanchez, the goalkeeper shares the spotlight with them.
For the past year, we’ve covered several stories about his controversial return to La Roja, since he had issues in the squad which put him in the headlines for months.
With everything sorted now, Bravo is back to being a national team hero, and his support for women’s football is doing the rounds in the Chilean media.
Outlet En Cancha managed to make an interview with Romina Parraguirre about the women’s national team, and as usual the support from big figures has been a topic in the conversation.
It was directly asked if men like Claudio Bravo could help the fight to get more attention, and she explained he’s actually been in touch with her.
“Yes, we had a conversation with him, and he did support us, he was very supportive of women’s football,” Parraguirre told En Cancha.
“What he was saying is that he can be the voice, but he doesn’t have the financial backing to support all of women’s football.”
Speaking of the biggest problems for women’s football in Chile, she said: “Everything is on a theme of culture. I was working in Australia in a private school doing football classes, where the girls start playing at 4 years old. There were mixed teams, where the culture feels that football is not only for men.
“In other countries they invest in women’s football, they invest in teams and by investing you are going to have better fields, you are going to have better training, where the players are going to be better and there you are going to be able to give a show where people see that this it’s good, where there is a good show. This is not happening here because it’s not invested. Big companies and teams don’t think this is a business.”
