The growth of women's football has been on the up especially since last summer's Women's World Cup in France - where 28.1m people watched the final.

Though there has been positives from this, such as increased attendances, more coverage of games, and higher-paid sponsorship deals, with more viewership comes more pressure and criticism. 

England's World Cup performance isn't the only competition that comes under the limelight - the 2019-20 Women's Super League season has also been on football supporters radars.

But can players deal with this criticism?

Talking to The Guardian in January, Keira Walsh, the Manchester City and England midfielder thinks she "probably underestimated how much attention was going to be on the games".

She added: "I really did struggle with the criticism off the back of [the World Cup]. There were times when I thought: 'Is this actually for me? Do I want to play football any more?'

"Sometimes people are very critical of me, which is fine, I can learn to deal with it, but people do tend to forget that I've still got time to improve and this isn't the finished product by any means."

Women's football as a whole off the back of this buzz is benefiting, but is still "screaming out for sponsorship, interviews and brands coming on board". Those the words of Atletico Madrid forward Toni Duggan - when talking to BBC Breakfast last May.

Since then, more brands have put their name to women's football competitions and clubs - with Barclays signing a multi-million sponsorship deal with the Women's Super League.

Alongside this, the Lionesses saw a record crowd of 77,768 when they faced Germany at Wembley in November.

Manchester United manager and former England captain, Casey Stoney, was asked if there is more criticism of players, she said:

"I think there is, and I think that should be what we want because we want visibility and we want people to judge the game for the game, rather than saying: 'Oh, unlucky.'"

Stoney wants female players to not "be treated any differently from the male players."

Adding, the women's game is "going to get the same judgement. The difference is: the male players are used to it. The women's game isn't used to it, and it's a big wake-up call for a lot of [the players] because they read it."