sport news There is NO excuse not to buy a ticket to women's matches after England's Euro ... trends now

This is a happy day, so let's start with a joke. An old Jewish joke.

Manny goes to the synagogue and prays. 'Lord,' he says. 'The business is going down the tubes. I can't afford to put petrol in my car. I can't afford to pay the mortgage. I think my wife might leave me. Please, please let me win the lottery.'

And nothing happens. Next week, he's back. 'Lord, it's worse,' he says. 'The business is closed. My savings are gone. I'm desperate. Please, I beg, let me win the lottery.'

Yet still nothing. Third week, Manny returns. 'Lord, the bailiffs are coming tomorrow. They've already taken the car. My wife is packing her suitcase. Please, please, it is my only hope. Let me win the lottery.'

And the clouds part, and God looks down. He shrugs his mighty shoulders. 'Manny,' he says, 'meet me halfway. Buy a ticket.'

So that's today's sermon. Buy a ticket. If you want this to be the game-changer for women's football, if you want this to be more than a match, more than a marquee event, more than a fancy occasion like a Jubilee or a royal wedding, it is going to take more than smiles, slogans and well-intended positivity.

'They think it's all over,' concluded Gabby Logan before the BBC conceded the greatest moment for women's sport in this country to a glorified schools sports day in Birmingham, 'but it's only just beginning.' And it was a great line, a lovely line, and we all hope it is true.

But is it? On Sunday, BBC 5 Live were broadcasting their preview programmes from the far corner of the bar at the Wembley Hilton. The space wasn't rammed, but it was busy. Downstairs, in the lobby, players' friends and families were queuing to collect their tickets. Little girls carried signs wishing the best to their aunties, who would be playing the biggest match of their lives that afternoon.

And the great and good of the women's game in England dutifully took the escalator two floors up to tell the nation of their hopes, their dreams and their excitement at what was to come.

Shortly before one o'clock, Emma Hayes appeared. There is probably no more recognisable figure in women's football. Hayes is the manager of England's best team, Chelsea, and a respected pundit on the men's game, too, with a national television profile.

And, yards from Wembley Stadium, just hours before the biggest match in the history of women's football here, she remained relatively unnoticed and untroubled.

Maybe followers of the women's game are just more polite. Maybe they didn't want to intrude. Hayes is a no-nonsense figure, but hardly unapproachable. A lady in a blue dress asked for a selfie, and she happily obliged. But that was it. When she left, Hayes walked through the public space unhindered.

So, soon after, did former Manchester City goalkeeper and 81-cap England international Karen Bardsley, until the same lady in blue stepped up again.

And this is a vignette. Maybe both women were mobbed on their short walk to the ground. Maybe in Costa Coffee their appearance would have caused mayhem. Yet so much is now invested in this victory, so much expectation, so much hope that one wonders whether a single game — any single game — can change the landscape so spectacularly.

Similar import was given to Jonny Wilkinson's drop-kick and England's victory in the 2003 World Cup. It was going to turn us into a rugby-playing nation, like New Zealand. Then there were the wins — both men's and women's — in the Cricket World Cup that would purportedly send us all flocking to the counties again.

And every four years an Olympic medal is presumed to inspire a rush to see rowers, canoeists, hockey players and cyclists. Then the caravan moves on and down at East Grinstead its back to the friends, families and veterans that would always turn up for hockey, with or without the podium finish.

The millions watching from their sofas do not convert to capacity stadiums we find. Leander Rowing Club, home to Sir Steven Redgrave, Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell, still scudded unnoticed along the Thames. And while you may occasionally thrill to the sport of curling, try to find a tournament outside Scotland.

On Sunday at Wembley there did seem to be rather a lot of cheery day-trippers. We're like the United States now, in our love for a big event.

The 1994 World Cup remains the best attended, even if many of the locals didn't really have a clue what they were watching. They cheered goal-kicks because launching a ball downfield is a big deal in NFL and they thought the same logic applied. But they had been told the World Cup was huge and bought into that.

As do we. Events that can prove a disappointing draw elsewhere — the Paralympics, the Commonwealth Games, the World Athletics Championships — do very well in the United Kingdom. All sorts of attendance records fell during this summer's Women's European Championship.

In terms of maintaining momentum, the start of the Women's Super League season is well set. On Saturday, September 10, Tottenham play Manchester United at the Tottenham Stadium, not Brisbane Road, Leyton, or The Hive, Barnet, where their games are more commonly situated.

Tottenham did not have a player in England's squad but United boast Mary Earps, Ella Toone and Alessia Russo, three heroes of this tournament, in a venue with a capacity of 62,850. It should be another great fillip for the women.

Yet it is the following day, at Brighton versus Aston Villa or Everton versus Leicester, where it is to be hoped the impact is most keenly felt. And this brings us back to Manny, and the need to at least get into the game. To, quite simply, buy a ticket.

For there really is no reason now. No reason, without support, to expect the rest of the sport, or the media, or the administrators, to drag women's football to where it is supposed to be.