{"id":651065,"date":"2026-05-05T12:00:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T12:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/651065\/"},"modified":"2026-05-05T12:00:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T12:00:16","slug":"playing-for-bayerns-women-and-scouting-for-the-men-i-hope-my-path-breaks-barriers-womens-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/651065\/","title":{"rendered":"Playing for Bayern\u2019s women and scouting for the men. I hope my path breaks barriers | Women’s football"},"content":{"rendered":"

The buzz after I mentioned doing some scouting in the men\u2019s game for Bayern Munich<\/a>, during my appearance as an analyst on Swedish broadcaster SVT for the men\u2019s team\u2019s Champions League match against Real Madrid, is a bit of a double-edged sword.<\/p>\n

On the one hand, I thought: \u2018Why is this such big news? It shouldn\u2019t be.\u2019 On the other hand, I understand it and I\u2019m happy there has been so much positivity and encouragement around it. I hope it widens people\u2019s perspectives and helps break barriers for women working in men\u2019s football, because I think we\u2019re ready for that, men\u2019s football is ready for it and it needs it. I hope it inspires other clubs to see it as a good idea. Why not give these opportunities to someone who wants them and wants to prepare for their career after football?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s all football: you\u2019re watching the same game, the same dynamics and I think we can contribute to each other. One of the things that really impressed me was the reason behind Bayern wanting to get me involved. The head of scouting, Nils Schmadtke, said: \u201cWe know you\u2019re going to offer such a good perspective. Yes, you are a woman and you\u2019re from women\u2019s football, but mainly you are an active football player and active football players always have a different perspective.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was important to me that it wasn\u2019t a token appointment. I was actually approached almost exactly a year ago. I have been a Bayern player since 2023 and received an email from someone with a Bayern email address that I didn\u2019t recognise. I thought they maybe wanted to talk about women\u2019s football. As I understand it, they asked the women\u2019s club\u2019s director of football, Bianca Rech, whether someone in the women\u2019s team would fit the role. Knowing that I love to watch football \u2013 I\u2019m a bit of a nerd like that \u2013 and that I\u2019m getting older, she recommended me.<\/p>\n

We arranged to meet and during that meeting I realised they were interested in me joining their department. I was totally honoured. They said: \u201cMagda, you can go home and think about it and let us know.\u201d I said: \u201cI don\u2019t need to think about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Magdalena Eriksson in the thick of the action against Union Berlin. Bayern were clear her playing career comes first. Photograph: Ebrahim Noroozi\/AP<\/p>\n

It felt like such a great opportunity and was something I had never imagined because in women\u2019s football scouting departments are rare because when there are limited resources you put them where they\u2019re most needed. Now, with more and more resources and more and more talent out there, I think creating scouting departments for women\u2019s teams is going to be crucial for the development of the game.<\/p>\n

After agreeing to join the department, I started my training through the summer. I even had a few sessions during the Euros in Switzerland with one of the scouts; just a few hours here and there to bring me up to speed on the way they work, the process and that side of things.<\/p>\n

The good thing is that the guys have been really clear with me that I am a footballer first and the club would never allow the scouting to impact negatively on that. That\u2019s been good to hear but I still struggle with it a little bit. I always want to do more, but I have to accept, especially in moments like these when we have so many games, that I can\u2019t do everything I want to do with the quality I want to do it.<\/p>\n

Once I began the new season, as a player, I went into the office at S\u00e4bener Strasse and got to learn the way things work in more detail. I had about six months of training, where they were sending me players they were looking at and training me in writing scouting reports and giving recommendations.<\/p>\n

Now I\u2019m feeling more warm in the role and I\u2019ve started getting more responsibilities, including making more decisions about what games and players I should watch, within the remit of the type of profile of player the club want and the positional targets. They recently restructured a bit and gave me responsibility for the South American market, so that\u2019s my main focus. It\u2019s a mix of me keeping track of the young players in different leagues and any new ones coming up and the bosses sending promising targets or tips for me to look at. That\u2019s been a fun new step in the process.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s exciting too because the individual quality in South America is unreal. Many players have moved from South America to Europe at a young age and are now world-class players and the fact that someone is keeping track of the young talent there is really important for the club.<\/p>\n

Pernille Harder (right) has been helping her fiancee with the scouting. \u2018She\u2019s a bit of a consultant,\u2019 Eriksson says. Photograph: \u00c1lex Caparr\u00f3s\/Uefa\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Despite being a centre-back, I look at all positions, except goalkeepers \u2013 thank God we have a goalkeeper scout, because that\u2019s beyond my expertise. It has been extremely interesting for me because normally when I watch a game I look at it through the lens of a centre-back. Now I\u2019m being forced to look at it from the perspective of a midfielder, forward or a winger too and that is widening my knowledge. Understanding what makes a really good midfielder and winger is maybe something I hadn\u2019t really reflected on.<\/p>\n

Having my fiancee, Pernille Harder, around helps with that aspect too. She also wants to stay in football beyond playing and is super-interested in young talent and helping to develop young players. We want to see more and better academies in the women\u2019s game. That stems from the experience most of us in the women\u2019s game have: being coached by our parents or volunteer coaches until well into our teens and not learning a lot of fundamentals until well into our careers. She will look over my shoulder to see who I\u2019m looking at and I\u2019ll ask her opinion, especially when I have attacking midfielders or wingers, about the offensive decision-making and the scanning and those kinds of things that she\u2019s an expert in. She\u2019s a bit of a consultant.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve watched a lot more of the Bayern men\u2019s team\u2019s games too, because I want to learn more about how they play and be able to see if a player can fit in that system. To really get to know our men\u2019s team and watch every game has been fun, especially with the season they\u2019re having.<\/p>\n

The whole thing has been a great experience and super-valuable no matter what route I go down in football. I\u2019m learning to do video edits, watching a lot of football and feel my knowledge of the game is increasing and if I become a scout, a coach, a sporting director or something else, all those are things that are important to take with me.<\/p>\n

Get in touch<\/p>\n

If you have any questions or comments about any of our newsletters please email moving.goalposts@theguardian.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is an extract from our free email about women\u2019s football, Moving the Goalposts. To get the full edition, visit this page and follow the instructions<\/a>. Moving the Goalposts is delivered to your inboxes every Tuesday and Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The buzz after I mentioned doing some scouting in the men\u2019s game for Bayern Munich, during my appearance…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":651066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-651065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/651065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=651065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/651065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/651066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=651065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=651065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=651065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}