# Could women play on MLS soccer teams and compete?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-women-play-on-mls-soccer-teams-and-compete/721537>\
**Category:** The Game Room\
**Created:** [June 3, 2015, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-women-play-on-mls-soccer-teams-and-compete/721537 "2015-06-03T14:57:24Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\
**Post date:** [June 5, 2015, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-women-play-on-mls-soccer-teams-and-compete/721537/41 "2015-06-05T12:48:56Z")

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> [@Xema](#):
>
> Yes - she is widely regarded as the most accomplished woman ever to have played the game, and by a considerable margin.
> 
> The fact that she was solidly among the chess elite does not alter the fact that the gap between men and women at the top of the sport is enormous.

This doesn’t make a strong case, though, for the notion that women couldn’t compete with men in chess, simply because there is no objective reason why they could not. What it suggests to me is that women just don’t play chess as much.

There are objective reasons why women cannot play NHL hockey and why it is unlikely there is even a single woman in the world even close to good enough.

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**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\
**Post date:** [June 7, 2015, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-women-play-on-mls-soccer-teams-and-compete/721537/42 "2015-06-07T01:24:58Z")

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> [@RickJay](#):
>
> This doesn’t make a strong case, though, for the notion that women couldn’t compete with men in chess, simply because there is no objective reason why they could not. What it suggests to me is that women just don’t play chess as much.

The percentage of both men and women who play chess seriously is low - clearly lower for women than for men. But large numbers of both play, and there is plenty of encouragement for those who are good to stick with it.

The fact that the list of Grandmasters typically consists of about 97% men argues that there may well be an objective reason. There are differences between male and female brains; very plausibly this is attributable to one or more of these.

Seen another way: for the observed difference between men and women not to be due to something objective argues that there is something about the way chess players are selected (or self-select) that drives away a hugely disproportionate number of the best women.

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