When England face Sweden tomorrow in the third-place play-off of the eighth Women’s World Cup, the nation will be justly proud of the players’ achievements. The Lionesses have provided at times breathless and exciting football, scoring more goals in France than at any previous World Cup. Phil Neville, the team’s manager, has an enviable record of just four defeats in 23 matches. England’s semi-final loss to the United States this week was the biggest UK television event of the year, with the BBC’s peak figure of 11.7m taking more than half of the audience share – a fivefold increase on England’s semi-final against Japan four years ago.

Women’s football has come of age in time to make the very most of such a moment. Across western Europe it is growing in popularity. The misogyny of the past, which saw women’s football banned in England, has thankfully gone. Sexism, unfortunately, has not completely disappeared: Patrice Evra, the former French captain who appeared as a pundit during last year’s men’s World Cup, applauded his female English co-panellist Eni Aluko, who writes for the Guardian, as if astonished to hear a woman offer a fluent and pointed analysis. It is a good thing for the beautiful game that such attitudes are the exception rather than the rule.

To capitalise on the surge of interest, there must be changes on both the supply and demand sides. The Stars and Stripes are the most successful team, having won the World Cup three times and four Olympic gold medals. The US maintains a pipeline of talent via a federal law that forces universities to spend as much on women’s sport as on men’s. The result is that while England has 120,000 female players registered, in the US the figure is 1.6m. There needs to be more attention focused on the grassroots here.

The talent needs somewhere to go. England’s Women’s Super League (WSL), with 12 teams, is Europe’s only full-time professional competition. Yet its clubs cannot stand on their own two feet. Some rely on Premier League backing to survive. Without the crowds – a WSL match averages just 1,000 fans – the game cannot thrive. It is remarkable that Sunderland, which provided the backbone of the present England squad, can no longer run a professional women’s team. Women’s football in England is in danger of becoming a southern sport – with no professional teams north of Manchester. That cannot be right.

Finance drives the US success. Between 2016 and 2018 women’s games generated about £40.7m in revenue, a fraction more than the men. Rightly, the US women’s team is fighting for equal pay. This would be a nice problem to have. Perhaps the key is broadcasting women’s top division games live on the BBC. It is clear that there is an appetite and high-profile exposure would help drive supporters to the matches. This in turn would increase funding for women’s football through commercial deals. That we are even discussing such things shows that, win or lose on the pitch, women’s football has triumphed.