Emma Hayes claims the men's game is 'not ready' to appoint female managers in incredibly candid interview

Emma Hayes has claimed that the men's game is 'not ready' to appoint female football managers in a new interview.

A female coach has never taken charge of a men's professional side in England on a permanent basis.

Forest Green appointed their academy manager, Hannah Dingley, to take over on an interim basis during pre-season last year.

However, she did not get the job full-time, with the League Two side appointing ex-Southampton B boss David Horseman instead.

While women have taken charge of men's sides at non-league levels, that hasn't yet stretched to the professional game.

Out of all the top female coaches in England, it is Hayes who has been regularly linked with taking over at men's clubs.

Those links have largely only related to clubs in League One and League Two.

Speaking at a press conference in 2021, Hayes shut down links to then third-tier side AFC Wimbledon, and questioned why her work at Chelsea - where she won the Women's Super League seven times and reached the final of the Women's Champions League - would be seen as a 'step down' from anything in the men's game.

Now, the 47-year-old, who is now the manager of the United States women's national team (USWNT) and won a surprise gold medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics, has claimed that the club owners in the men's game are 'not ready' to give female coaches the opportunities to take charge of professional sides.

"I've said this a million times over," she told BBC Radio 5 Live.

"You can find a female pilot, a female doctor, a female lawyer, a female banker. But you can't find a female coach working in the men's game, leading men. It just shows you how much work there is to be done.

"That's why, for me, it's about those that are in charge that you have to ask the questions to.

"I think it's been a place which has just been, you know, the large majority have been males in that situation. And often people don't think maybe that a female can manage in a dressing room of male characters.

"I manage about 25 men every day, they're just the staff that I work with.

"I never thought the players would be the problem - I think players want to be coached, and if there is the best available coach that happens to be a female, they'll get their heads around it. Just like they would with anything else in life."