The Vatican City women's national football team is the team that represents

Vatican City Vatican City, officially the Vatican City State (; ), is a Landlocked country, landlocked sovereign state and city-state; it is enclaved within Rome, the capital city of Italy and Bishop of Rome, seat of the Catholic Church. It became inde ...

association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

and is under the control of the

Vatican Amateur Sports Association The Amateur Sports Association () is an Italian sports association of employees who work in the Vatican City. The Association is headquartered in Italy and has an operative office in the Cortile di San Damaso inside the Vatican. The current Pres ...

, headquartered in the Vatican's Cortile di San Damaso. Gianfranco Guadagnoli, an Italian, is the current head coach, in addition to being the coach of the men's national team. Susan Volpini is the current manager.

History

At Vatican Family Day in June 2018, a group of women organized to play football against each other as the male employees had done for years. Soon after they competed in a tournament organized by the Bambino Gesù Hospital. The national representative team was first formed in 2019 and played its first match on 26 May of that year. The team took on A.S. Roma of the women's

Serie A The Serie A (), officially known as Serie A Enilive in Italy and Serie A Made in Italy abroad for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Italy and the highest tier of the Italian football league system. Establish ...

, the highest level of women's

football in Italy Football ( ) is the most popular sport in Italy. The Italy national football team have won the FIFA World Cup four times (1934, 1938, 1982, 2006), trailing only Brazil (with five), runners-up in two finals both against Brazil, (1970, 1994) and ...

. The Vatican side lost 0–10 at the Campo Pio XI. On 7 June 2019, the team played their first "away" match, traveling across Rome to face the women's team of

Serie D The Serie D () is the highest level of semi-professional football in Italy, and the fourth tier of the Italian national league system. It sits beneath the third and lowest fully professional league, Serie C, and feeds in to it through promotion ...

club A.S.D. Trastevere Calcio. Despite the 1–3 defeat, the Vatican City team earned a penalty kick which was converted for the team's first-ever goal. After several months of preparation and planning, the team traveled to Austria to face Wiener Landesliga (women's third division) side FC Mariahilf at a stadium in

Simmering Simmering is a food preparation technique by which foods are cooked in hot liquids kept just below the boiling point of water (lower than ) and above poaching temperature (higher than ). To create a steady simmer, a liquid is brought to a boil, ...

in Vienna on 22 June 2019 as part of the club's twentieth anniversary. However, the match was abandoned after several FCM players displayed

pro-choice Abortion-rights movements, also self-styled as pro-choice movements, are movements that advocate for legal access to induced abortion services, including elective abortion. They seek to represent and support women who wish to terminate their ...

t-shirts under their jerseys during the playing of Vatican City's national anthem.

Players

As of 2018, there are approximately 800 female employees of Vatican City. The squad consists of female Vatican employees and wives and daughters of Vatican employees. In 2019, about 20 to 25 women between the ages of 25 and 50 comprised the squad. There were only lay workers and no

nun A nun is a woman who vows to dedicate her life to religious service and contemplation, typically living under vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience in the enclosure of a monastery or convent.''The Oxford English Dictionary'', vol. X, page 5 ...

s on the squad but nuns are welcome to play. Although most team members are merely amateur players, some, such as Cameroonian captain Eugenie Tcheugoue, have played at higher levels.

Team image

Kits and crest

As of 2019, the team wears an all yellow Givova top with the Sport Association logo in the center of the chest.

Home stadium

The Vatican City women's national football team plays their home matches on the Campo Pio XI.

Results and fixtures

The following is a list of match results in the last 12 months, as well as any future matches that have been scheduled. ;Legend

2019

2023

2024

Coaching staff

Current coaching staff

Notable players

* Eugenie Tcheugoue - captain

Manager history

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vatican City Women's National Football Team European national and official selection-teams not affiliated to FIFA Women's