Issues Aside, This 2015 Women's Cup in Canada Could Be a Classic

The grass will be artificial, but the football will be real as the biggest FIFA Women’s World Cup finals in the history of the event are played in Canada over the next five weeks.

Since the inaugural Women's World Cup in 1991, when just 12 nations competed and many of the 80-minute games were watched by meagre crowds and with barely a hint of media coverage, the women’s game has grown enormously. With an expansion for this seventh edition to 24 teams, eight of them contesting the finals for the first time, the tournament promises to be the biggest and the best that the women’s game has seen.

World Cup lead-up marred by controversy

If that promise is to be fulfilled, then football must take centre stage after the build-up to this seventh edition of the event was surrounded by controversies. The most bitter of those was the attempt by players to force FIFA into reversing its decision to have all matches played on artificial grass, per NPR.

Sex discrimination and risk of injury were at the core of the players’ argument that grass—as at all major men’s tournaments—should be the surface of choice. USA midfielder Heather O’Reilly reckoned that the thought of playing the World Cup finals on artificial grass was “almost laughable," and "a blatant demonstration of FIFA not placing the women side by side with the men."

Stars such as Brazil’s five-time World Player of the Year Marta, Homare Sawa of World Cup holders Japan and O’Reilly’s USA teammate Abby Wambach were among a group of 84 players from 13 different countries that went to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario to fight what ultimately became a lost battle.

The issue may seem to have been sidelined since the players dropped their lawsuit, but it will re-emerge—and fuelled with some passion—if artificial turf-related injuries occur during a tournament that will be in the spotlight far more than any previous Women’s World Cup.

Eyes of the world on "soccer-mad" Canada and the women's game

Huge media interest and other profile-boosters, such as the news that the FIFA 16 computer game is to feature female footballers for the first time, are combining to give the women’s game its best ever opportunity to establish itself as a truly major sporting attraction.

Canada 2015 may prove to be the perfect time and place to give the game that lift-off.

“Canada is soccer-daft," Canada head coach John Herdman told me as he looked ahead to the competition, which his team kick off with the opening match against China in Edmonton on Saturday.

"The world will get to see what women’s football means in this country—it’s a leading sport. The fans are very passionate and so proud of the women’s team,” added the former New Zealand coach, who took over the Canadian side when it was at its lowest ebb following a last-place finish at the 2011 World Cup.

A year after taking over, when the Canucks won bronze at the Olympic Games in London, Herdman—an Englishman—realised how much the women’s team meant to the Canadian nation.

“Apparently, the whole of Canada stopped and watched that bronze-medal game (a 1-0 win against France)," said the coach.

“It was Canada’s first medal in a team sport since 1935, so it was a unique moment and the team came back as heroes and national icons.”

Can Canada ride home advantage to glory?

Now Herdman’s players are hoping to surpass that fine achievement by claiming World Cup gold, and though they are seen as no more than dark horses to lift the trophy, the coach believes playing on home soil will be a big help.

“I feel sorry for any of the teams that have to play against us, because there’ll be a sea of red in the stands and that could get us through," he said.

“On paper, we don’t have a FIFA all-star team. But when the players connect together and they have 50,000 people around them, I think we could be OK. You’ve got to feel that you can win the competition and I certainly believe in this team. We’ve got a really good spine of players with a good supporting act around them, so who knows what we might achieve?”

Tom Szczerbowski/Getty Images

Large, partisan crowds should at least help Canada get out of Group A, in which their opponents after China will be Herdman’s old team, New Zealand, and a Netherlands side that—with teenage scoring sensation Vivianne Miedema leading their attack—could be one of the tournament’s surprise packages.

Usual suspects Germany and the USA are the favourites to take the world crown. Both are two-time winners of the competition and both aim to stand alone as record title-holders. The Germans, who face Norway, Thailand and the Ivory Coast in Group B, surprisingly went out at the the 2011 quarter-final stage in their own country after winning gold in 2003 and 2007.

But having since won Euro 2013 with a team missing six key players through injury—and having subsequently overtaken the USA as the world’s top-ranked team—they travel to Canada in confident mood.

USA seek redemption in group of death, France a threat

The USA will step into Group D—tagged "the group of death" (a must-have at every World Cup), along with Australia, Nigeria and a Sweden team led by former U.S. coach Pia Sundhage—after a nine-match unbeaten run which followed some poor results around the turn of the year.

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Head coach Jill Ellis has taken criticism from fans but has stood firm to her footballing principles. She looks to guide her team to a first World Cup gold since 1999’s memorable final victory over China, watched by what remains a record crowd for a women's sporting event, 90,185 at the Pasadena Rose Bowl. The brickbats may be ready for Ellis if she fails to return home with the trophy after telling Fox Sports TV on the day of her appointment 13 months ago that nothing less than winning the World Cup would be considered success.

France looks the most likely to wreck the plans of the Americans and Germans. For too long, the French have been the nearly women at major tournaments. Beaten semi-finalists at the 2011 World Cup and likewise at the 2012 Olympics, Les Bleus were then the best side at Euro 2013 but lost out to unfancied Denmark in the quarter-finals.

Since the appointment of Philippe Bergeroo as head coach in July 2013, however, they have become a more solid, consistent unit. And after climbing to third in the world rankings, the French will be serious contenders this time.

France should not find Group F, which also contains England, Mexico and Colombia, too demanding. But if results go as the seedings suggest, they will meet Germany in the quarter-finals—"nil points" there to the FIFA fixture computer as that game could have made for a great final.

Japan's hopes of retaining trophy, Brazil set for tough draw

Japan, who beat the USA in 2011’s final, have lost some of their sheen but should be too good for Switzerland, Cameroon and Ecuador in Group C and could then—as they did four years ago—grow into the tournament.

Brazil, the only South American side to have reached every edition of the World Cup and runners-up to Germany in 2007, will be expected to progress to the latter stages but have feisty Group E opposition from Costa Rica, South Korea and debutants Spain.

Issues aside, it's going to be a World Cup to remember

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Whichever team raises the trophy at the end of July 5’s final will be a deal richer, thanks to a record prize fund of $15 million—that’s $5 million more than four years ago and another marker in the upward mobility of women’s football. As one of the main drivers in progressing the sport, FIFA can take a bow for its funding, which undoubtedly underpins the World Cup and other significant developments. However, that funding still lags way behind the men’s game—the total prize pot for last year’s World Cup finals in Brazil, for example, was $576 million.

And as England’s Independent newspaper noted last week in the wake of the arrests of several senior FIFA officials in an FBI investigation into corruption allegations, "FIFA spent £17.6million on services at a single Zurich hotel last year, according to its own financial results—double the money it had invested in women’s football between 2011 and 2014."

With other issues surrounding this Women’s World Cup, including the lack of female coaches—only eight of the 24 teams have a woman in charge—the tournament is clearly about much more than 52 games of football.

For the next five weeks though, let’s concentrate on that football. There are fine players and teams to watch in six Canadian cities spread across five time zones and, believe me, it’s going to be a great World Cup.

Tony Leighton will be covering the Women's World Cup on location in Canada for Bleacher Report.