In the event we are about to narrate there is nothing strange, nothing incredible. We are not talking about epochal revolutions or events that have shifted the axis of history.. or at least. Perhaps in an ideal world this would not be the case. Yet here we are telling this story: on October 2, Maria Sole Ferrieri Caputi achieved a small revolution, becoming the first woman to referee a Serie A match, Sassuolo vs Salerno at the Mapei Stadium in Reggio Emilia.
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Born in Livorno in 1990, Maria Sole has a bachelor's degree in Political Science and a master's degree in Sociology and is currently working in Bergamo at Adapt law study center and at the University as a researcher. Her debut as a professional referee dates back to 2015, during the Levito vs Atletico San Paolo match, but the highlight that allowed her to conquer the Serie A came during the 2021/2022 season, in the Cagliari-Cittadella Coppa Italia match. It was a particularly difficult match, but handled with great professionalism by Maria Sole, a result that allowed her to obtain a Serie A call-up.
In Europe, she is the third woman to referee a match that falls within the top five leagues (Serie A, Premiere League, Bundesliga, Ligue 1) after France's Stéphenie Frappart, who made her Ligue 1 debut in 2019, and Germany's Bibiana Steinhaus, who made her Bundesliga debut in 2017, but in Italy this is an absolute first. And there should be nothing unusual about that.
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It is not a sport for women
Yet it makes headlines, because soccer is still an incredibly masculine sport. According to data reported by a 2020 Women in Football network survey, two out of three women working in soccer have experienced incidents of sexism in the workplace, and half of those surveyed perceive that they are judged primarily by their appearance rather than by skills and abilities. Not to mention the stark disparities that exist between men's and women's professional soccer, where recognition for professional female athletes came only in the 2022/2023 season with the addition of health, social security, and contribution protections to provide support and advocacy for female players.
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But a strong weight (and it sounds absurd, but it is so) is given by the dense mixture of prejudices and stereotypes that still reign in Italian soccer: a world that seems to be tied to a model of toxic masculinity, anchored to an idea of sport as machismo and prevarication of the other. Soccer is the most loved and followed sport in Italy, and in a sense it has become the mirror of a widespread, retrograde but still dominant, albeit now challenged, Italian mentality, where sexism is often intertwined with other discriminations, such as homophobia and racism. But soccer after all is sport and sport is for everyone, men, women, anyone.
And stories like Maria Sole's are more valuable than ever: because they are factual demonstrations, that in the end being a referee is not a task that is given to men by divine right, but a simple action, for which professionalism, passion and commitment are enough. And of course there is still a lot of rhetoric, the narrative of the mythological "first women who," as if we were a category not worthy of having names and surnames, the diatribes on choosing masculine or feminine when referring to a profession, there are those who wonder whether in the future Maria Sole will prefer to prioritize a career or have a family. A trite corollary that seems to accompany every woman who breaks a wall of hardship, but which we must eliminate by simply demonstrating that yes, it is a men's game, but it is also a women's game.
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And at such a complex moment in history, when we are projected into the future but at the same time it seems that, from a rights point of view, we are going backwards at the speed of light, a small silent revolution like Maria Sole's is absolutely more than welcome.
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