Women's World Cup 2023: From changing in airport toilets to qualifying for first tournament

It's a great time to be involved in women's football in the Republic of Ireland as Vera Pauw's side get ready for their first World Cup.

However, it wasn't always this way.

On 4 April 2017, less than six years before their historic qualification, 16 players took an extraordinary stand at Liberty Hall in Dublin to highlight a lack of support from the Football Association of Ireland [FAI].

It was an unprecedented moment, a brave move which ultimately laid the foundations for their future success.

It was costing players to play for their country, there was a lack of resources and the players complained about having to get changed in airport toilets in order to hand tracksuits back at the end of international camps.

It was time for an ultimatum. The message was clear: conditions must improve and the players must be listened to, or the team would go on strike for the upcoming friendly with Slovakia.

As Stuart Gilhooly, a solicitor for the Professional Footballers' Association of Ireland [PFAI], said at the time, he felt the senior women's team was "the dirt on the shoe of the FAI".

"It's easy to forget just how bad things were," Gilhooly recalled.

"The tracksuits, I think were a bit of a side show, but in reality what we wanted to ensure was the players, particularly domestic players, it didn't actually cost them money to play for their country.

"They were having to forgo their work commitments, not get paid for work and they were getting nothing for showing up to play for their country.

"They needed to get paid for turning up to matches, which they weren't.

"Just the most basic of conditions you would expect an international football team to have."

Gilhooly said he and Stephen McGuinness, general