To start a sport always involves many questions: who to look for, how much to invest, when to take the first step. For this, there is Joga Miga, a nonprofit project that offers soccer lessons and training for both women who already practice the sport or who wants to start playing. The project’s main purpose is to develop a practice of women’s football with quality, regardless of the level of knowledge.
The trainings are divided in physical, technical and collective parts, and there are no requirements of age nor previous physical preparation for the players. The aim is to encourage women’s football practice and to enjoy what the collective sport has to offer: fun, friendships and a better quality of life.
Image Source: @jogamiga
With affordable values, in order to popularize the sport, those interested can choose between the monthly fee of R$ 50 – with weekly training – or a one-off workout, with a value of R$ 20,00. The training, lasting almost two hours, takes place in soccer fields in the districts of Pompeia, Tatuapé and Butantã.
Nayara Perone, founder of Joga Miga, says that the creation of the project in 2013 was to stimulate other women and create a supportive environment. “Women’s football may have been denied us at some point, but we are here to learn and evolve together” is the phrase that highlights the project.
Where are women playing soccer?
At the beginning of 2019, Joga Miga started a new proposal: an online map that gathers information about women’s soccer classes and amateur teams’ training all over Brazil.
Image Source: Joga Miga Website
The platform is collaborative and disseminates data such as address, scheduled classes, values and ways to get in contact with the respective soccer coach and teams in Brazil, in order to connect them with possible new athletes. It is also possible to register new teams — in March 18, for example, 87 teams were registered on the website, with the majority (42) in the State of São Paulo.
The idea is to encourage sports practice and popularize soccer in Brazil among women. Once, despite the large volume of investments in male teams, the female category is still discouraged, coexisting with a routine of low wages, lack of investment, small structure and lack of professionalism, among others challenges.