Mariana Cabral has a coaching CV to be proud of. Born on the small Azores island of São Miguel, she has been in charge of the women’s teams at clubs including Benfica and Sporting, but the 38-year-old is frustrated. “We want more women coaches,” she says. “Who won the Euros? Who won the Champions League? Women – but we are losing so many.”
Cabral has her A Licence but is stuck in limbo. Unable to get on a Pro Licence course that would clear a path to more senior head coach roles in an era when women’s teams are increasingly demanding that qualification, she stepped back to become a No 2 in the US. But after one NWSL season with Utah Royals, she left in December in the hope that expanding her experience at another club would help to open a Pro Licence door.
“Last season I had an approach from a club here in the US to be a head coach, but without the Pro Licence I can’t,” Cabral says. “I had had two offers in Spain at the beginning of the season and one in Saudi Arabia, but they all wanted the Pro Licence. They’re opportunities that have just gone down the drain. It’s really disappointing because this is what I want to do and this is what I’ve worked for so many years for.”
One of the problems, says Cabral, is that the admission criteria for Pro Licence courses, which in Europe are set by Uefa but can be added to by national associations, in some cases prioritise coaching in the men’s game. Another, she says, is that courses haven’t expanded to meet the demand for top coaches in the women’s game.
Courses are expensive too, costing up to €15,000, and there is no centralised system for checking application opening times and course details, leaving coaches to go through websites federation by federation to see where they meet the criteria, when courses start and end, the requirements and even the language they are conducted in.
According to Uefa the number of female coaches with Uefa C, B, A or Pro Licences rose to 25,000 in 2024, an increase of more than 75% in eight years.
“The question that is always asked is: ‘Why more women aren’t involved in coaching?’ Well, because they try and they can’t,” says Cabral. “It’s really hard when you get to the high coaching badges, not just the Pro, but also the A Licence. The Pro is the worst though because there are so few spots on the courses. Ten years ago, or even five years ago, maybe those spots were enough to cope with the demand from men’s football, but the growth of women’s football means we have a lot more coaches on the women’s side now, women and men, but we still have a similar number of spots.”
In line with the Uefa women’s football strategy, its coaching convention includes targets to improve diversity and representation on courses. Ten per cent of places are reserved for appropriately qualified female coaches. If fewer than 10% of the female candidates meet those criteria, organisers have an option – but not an obligation – to accept less-qualified women, provided they meet the Uefa minimums. Uefa also has a scholarship scheme as part of its coach development programme for women.
Cabral, though, is an example of the bottleneck. “I still had a contract here with Utah Royals but I asked to leave,” she says. “My biggest goal, my first goal, is trying to get my Pro Licence, which has been very hard. I didn’t get on to the course in Portugal and I tried in Wales and I didn’t get on there. It takes at least a year to get your Pro Licence. I felt if I stayed here I would be comfortable but I would stay in the exact same place. I want to grow and if I want to be a better coach and have new experiences, I needed to go.”
Cabral is open to work in the US or Europe. She knows others whose coaching careers have been on hold while they wait to get on to courses. “This affects a lot of women,” she says. “I’ve talked to some assistant coaches here in the US and they have the same difficulties. Some have tried to get on to courses here, but the issue is that the Pro Licence here is only valid for the US and you would have to do another course if you wanted to go somewhere else.
“Some other women coaches I know, in Portugal, have paused to have families and then when they come back they find it harder to get on to the courses and start to question whether this is the career for them. Then they either stop being a coach or just do it as a part-time job.
Cabral says she has run into another barrier familiar in the women’s game: working conditions. At Sporting she secured a surprise 2-0 win over Eintracht Frankfurt in a Champions League qualifier last season, then beat the Icelandic side Breidablik in the first round before losing to Real Madrid. But she says she and the team “suffered a lot” in a battle for resources.
“I’m very outspoken and ambitious and pushed for the club to give us better conditions. It’s a difficult relationship sometimes because when a club is doing OK, they don’t really want to invest in the team.
“I quit because I didn’t want to be in that kind of environment any more. Having to fight every day for basic conditions is tough. You have to convince people every day. You walk into a room and you know that people are a little bit irritated to see you, or they sigh because they know that you’re coming to ask for something, and I’m not talking about wanting millions of euros, I’m talking about the basics, like a place to get dressed and a nice pitch that you don’t have to wait for all of the men’s teams to finish training on. The mental toll of those battles is really big.”
