The list of feminist heroes expands: meet Minnie Cruttwell

Minnie Cruttwell was so incensed that her local team was going to dump her on her twelfth birthday, simply for being a girl, that she decided to take the matter further, and wrote to Tessa Jowell (the minister responsible for sport among other things) and even took part in a Parliamentary Committee on the subject.

The FA have now decided to live with the threat of twelve year old girls playing football with boys. Of course, let's not get over exited, they have not quite decided what they are going to do yet and may simply raise the bar to fourteen, but that's still moving forwards ain't it?

What always puzzles me about the argument against equal footing in footie is that if women couldn't cope with the game then you wouldn't need to ban them from playing would you? I mean, they'd just be useless and wouldn't get anywhere in the sport. You only need to ban people from doing things that they CAN do, not things that they CAN'T.

In the UK football has outpaced even netball as girls' number one choice of sport and to continue to bar women from playing in male teams, even when they are of the highest standard, is simply unjustifiable.

Minnie says "It doesn't matter if you are a boy or a girl, it's your ability to play that matters. I was upset and angry that the FA didn't think that girls are as good as boys. I enjoy playing because you have to be skillful and it makes you feel good. My friends think it's normal that I play football. I train twice a week after school. I am the only girl on my team but the boys treat me the same as everybody else. A lot of my friends play for the team. I don't mind where I play but at the moment I play in defence; I slide easily when I tackle. "

In other news the already controversial Miss Universe contest (that I spoke about before) has been beset with more controversy as Miss Sweden pulls out because the contest is "degrading to women". I'm curious to know how you get to the finals and *then* realise this, but I guess the swimsuit section just pushed her over the edge and out of the competition.

Whatever it was that caused the revelation on her road to Damascus (well, Mexico City) it's all to the good. Perhaps if contestants keep pulling out like this we can finally see the end of this throw back to older, more reactionary times.