Her Playground: What grabbed our attention in August

Showcasing just how many people are out there driving women’s and girls’ sport forward helps strengthen our work — in increasing visibility of the fight behind the scenes, we demonstrate that the momentum is only moving one way.

Tying into the regular broad focus on the Her Playground social media channels, we introduce a monthly rundown looking at different projects and initiatives that got our attention in the preceding weeks as well as a summary of steps of note in handball.

Focus topic: Imagery of female athletes

The way in which female athletes are portrayed in terms of imagery has been a significant topic grabbing our attention lately. That is thanks mainly to two reports:

• EBU (European Broadcasting Union) Sport: Raising the Bar — Guidelines for Respectful Media Coverage in Women’s Athletics

• Getty Images: Visual GPS, especially the Women and Girls in Sport Guidelines

EBU Sport: Raising the Bar

Raising the Bar is a guide released by EBU Sport to help ensure respectful coverage of women’s athletics. Raising the Bar offers practical guidelines for camera angles and broadcast direction that maximise storytelling while prioritising athletic performance, editorial integrity and professional dignity.

EBU Sport emphasise that the guidelines should help prioritise the qualities that define athletics and the athletes that participate in the sport with no loss in storytelling ability.

The publication was created in consultation with three Olympic athletes: Holly Bradshaw (pole vault; Great Britain), Ivana Španović (long jump; Serbia), and Blanka Vlašić (high jump; Croatia). The athletes advocate for the guidelines not only for the necessary element of respect in coverage, but also due to the educational value of the images. For example, how in high jump a certain camera angle can properly showcase the run-up, which is such a crucial element of a successful jump. Respecting the women in the sport drives value beyond “only” that respect.

Getty Images: VisualGPS

The Getty Images VisualGPS provides insights on industries, regions and demographics through research on how images are being used. The research shows shifts in consumer sentiment, customer use and the visual landscape.

As such, the VisualGPS is a useful barometer regarding images of women and girls in sport — and it shows there is a preference to show men and boys in sports images.

US-based research showed that in 2021, women were featured 30 per cent more often in the most popular Getty Images visuals. Despite this, media organisations are 33 times more likely to focus on male athletes and, in those organisations, female athletes appear in sports visuals only three per cent of the time. Popular sports visuals have been shown to depict boys 30 per cent more of the time than girls.

When women and girls are shown in sports visuals, they are shown differently than men and boys. Men and boys are much more likely to be shown competing or being athletic.

Females are:

• 2.5 times less likely to be shown competing and 48 per cent more likely to be shown in portrait

• Four times less likely to be shown scoring

• Two times less likely to be shown winning

• shown doing general exercise 37 per cent more often than men

Regarding the latter, while it could seem positive, visualise what that means — that we are more likely to see a woman in a pilates class than having fun playing a team sport with friends; that we are more likely to see a woman working on her fitness alone than in a competitive scenario that celebrates skill. "This [statistics] is an indicator of a cultural tendency toward perpetuating body consciousness rather than body positivity," states Getty Images.

When it comes to team sports, men are three times more likely to be shown playing those than women, and boys are two times more likely than girls.

72 per cent of consumers say, "I’d like to see female athletes portrayed in an authentic way that focuses on their skill and athleticism."

Highlight project of the month: Women’s Sport Trust

Founded in 2012, the Women’s Sport Trust is, as stated on their website, a UK charity “focused on using the power of sport to accelerate gender equality and stimulate social change.”

The Women’s Sports Trust runs and has run a number of campaigns and launched a multitude of initiatives in their 14 years of existence, from the provision of quarterly visibility reports to programmes for elite athletes to learn about areas such as personal branding, social media and working with sponsors.

Their visibility reports have been highly influential in the Her Playground project, as we aim to understand the global position of women’s sport and how far there is to go before true equality is reached.

Success story: Professional Women’s Hockey League — USA and Canada

The earliest documentation of a women’s ice hockey game dates to 1892, since when numerous women’s leagues have come and gone. On the men’s side, the National Hockey League (NHL) was founded in 1917.

The players themselves have been the driving force in trying to create and sustain professional women’s leagues. But no women’s ice hockey league prior to 2015 offered salaries for athletes.

In 2019, a high-profile group of players formed the Professional Women's Hockey Players Association (PWHPA) to advocate for a sustainable league. The group had previously abstained from playing any league until women's professional hockey received the resources it needed.

In 2023, the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) was officially revealed and the first season began on New Year’s Day 2024. The PWHL has been a huge success, proving what real investment can do for the women’s game in any team sport — that is, drive rapid development. By April 2024, the PWHL was setting a new global record for attendance at a women’s hockey game, at 21,105.

The 2025/26 season saw a number of notable milestones:

• regular season attendance passed 1.1 million

• the sponsorship portfolio grew by 35 per cent

• e-commerce merchandise sales increased by over 50 per cent

• more than 682 million social media impressions were generated

From starting with six teams, the PWHL sees 12 participating in the 2026/27 season. And in June 2026, the PWHL announced its first external investors, promising continued growth into the future.

Attacking the goal: What’s happening in handball?

Last season before format changes

The start of the 2026/27 season is just around the corner — the last season with the EHF Champions League Women and EHF European League Women played under the current format. After this season, in which Metz Handball aim to defend their historic title, changes aiming to increase the competitiveness of both the top- and second-tier competition will be introduced.

The main change in the EHF Champions League Women will be a restructure from two groups of eight teams to four groups of four. The top three sides in each group will then progress to a main round, from which the first four in each group qualify for the quarter-finals.

The EHF European League Women will see an expanded group phase and do away with qualification rounds. Instead, 24 teams, divided into six groups of four, will battle for places in the knockout round. The idea of the new system is to strengthen the development of middle-ranked clubs and ultimately achieve a bigger pool of teams in the EHF Champions League competing at the very highest level.

Promotion of women’s handball

Feeding the future of women’s handball and its visibility, two recent steps have been taken: The release of the first EHF Champions League Women documentary, “The Magic Moment,” and the appointment of new Her Playground role model Barbara Arenhart.

Arenhart joins the original four role models: Katrine Lunde, Andrea Lekic, Estelle Nze Minko and Joyce van Haaster. Arenhart was world champion in 2013 with Brazil and has been a long-time Champions League star, but, like the other role models, brings something else to the position: In short, she has experienced and overcome her fair share of personal challenges, which have shaped her into the joyful, strong person she is.

The Magic Moment tells the story of the EHF FINAL4 Women 2026 through the eyes of four protagonists, representing the four clubs: Brest Bretagne’s Anna Vyakhireva, Györ’s Bruna de Paula, Metz Handball’s Chloé Valentini and CSM Bucuresti’s Elizabeth Omoregie. With the first such documentary focused on the men’s competition released in 2023, The Magic Moment marks a significant step forward in completely equalising all EHF competitions.

A special feature of The Magic Moment is Valentini’s story — not only due to her being part of the title-winning team, but because her journey to the EHF FINAL4 in Budapest involved becoming a mother, maternity leave and her return to the court. The subject of motherhood and especially maternity leave among handball players is one that has been closely examined on Her Playground and is an important topic for the EHF and European handball in general.

Lunde leads IHF Women’s Handball Working Group

The International Handball Federation (IHF) announced a new-form Women’s Handball Working Group in June. The group is comprised of eight members, including Her Playground role model Lunde as chair.

“I feel a bit of responsibility because I really got a lot from the handball and I want also that so many other girls and also kids can experience all of the fun with handball and maybe learn something from it,” says Lunde.

“I also see that kids or girls who do sport, they will also be some kind of good leaders. They have something, you know — you learn a lot when you are playing handball and you want to reach your goals and you have something you want to reach, so you are working step by step, so you learn how to do that as well. I really hope that we can do something with that.”

The aims defined by the IHF Women’s Handball Working Group are strongly linked to those in the EHF’s Women’s Handball Roadmap 2029, highlighting alignment between the two organisations in a way that will serve the women’s branch of the game.

Photos © kolektiff images/Anze Malovrh/Axel Heimken/Jozo Cabraja/Uros Hocevar; Fradi.hu; Siarhei Nester; RUN 4 FFWPU; Boom Photography; Ron Lach; Tony Schnagl