Teachers have revealed that the number of girls playing is now the same as the boys and the girls are even struggling to keep the football to break times.

PE co-ordinator at The Olive School, Suhail Sidat said: “There have been a few instances in class when I’ve caught a few girls passing notes to each other. You ask them what they’re doing and they say ‘Sir, we’re just doing tactics for football.”

The school’s head teacher Julie Bradley hopes the school’s new enthusiasm for football doesn’t stop there, she said: “Hopefully one day, one of our girls will be the captain of England, who knows?”

Tauheedul Education Trust, to which The Olive School belongs, was recently designated as an FA Girls’ Area Hub, joining a network of organisations that support and deliver girls’ football across the country.

This week The FA announced that they will be increasing their investment in the women and girl’s game by an additional £50m over six years. The increased investment will help ensure the sustainability of successful participation initiatives.

Report courtesy of the FA via Pitch

Girls and women across the country are encouraged to play football as part of the week, the second to take place this year, which runs from 10-16 October.

Participating organisations can register here  and they will then be able to access resources such as session plans and ideas and promotional tools.

In April more than 52,000 girls took part in the first week’s activities in sessions delivered in schools, clubs, community groups and wider organisations across the country, double the original target of participants.

This autumn additional focus will be on encouraging higher and further education establishments to put on female-specific sessions at the start of their academic years. It is hoped that more than 22,000 will take part, a 20 per cent increase on October 2015 – and reaching 75,000 women and girls in total in 2016.

The weeks are being delivered in partnership with the Independent Schools FA, English Schools FA, Association of Colleges Sport, British Universities and Colleges Sport, the Premier League and the English Football League.

Kelly Simmons, FA director of football participation and development, said: “We’re encouraging as many further and higher educational institutions as possible, along with schools, clubs and other organisations to put on sessions and give more women and girls the chance to play football.

“Hopefully these will prove popular and will continue to run throughout the academic year, giving people the opportunity to play regularly and enjoy their football, which we know is crucial to increasing participation.”

Football is the largest female team sport in England with more than 2.89m players. There are more than 5,900 women’s and girls’ teams playing affiliated club football.

Report courtesy of the FA