The push to end the gender bias in scheduling is being put to the International Olympic Committee and the governing bodies of all major sports, and could even see the 2032 Brisbane Olympic women’s 100m grand final gazump the men’s for the prime-time slot.

Australian and UK experts, writing in the British Journal of Sports Medicine today, said women’s match finals were invariably considered a “warm-up” for men’s, which sent a message that women were second class athletes.

Lead author Dr Klaus Gebel, of the University of Technology in Sydney’s School of Public Health, said structural barriers to women in sport, including the bias to showcase male finals, needed to end.

Olympic Games were a prime target, he said.

“We suggest one small, yet potentially impactful change. We call on the International Olympic Committee and all major sports federations around the world who run events in which both men and women compete, such as tennis, to alternate the order of the men’s and women’s finals between tournaments,” Gebel said.

“It is time to challenge the gender hierarchy in sport, and to explicitly and proudly demonstrate that the achievements of female athletes are as valued as those of male athletes.”

Despite Serena Williams, en route to becoming one of the greatest athletes in sports history, dominating coverage in her final US Open and women’s sport internationally and domestically continuing its meteoric rise in popularity, the experts said female athletes were still fighting for equality in sport.

Tackling the second-tier status often applied to women’s sport in Australia, Federal Sports Minister Anika Wells this week launched a national push to increase female representation in boardrooms and on the field across all major Australian sporting codes.

“Women continue to be under-represented, not just across participation but also across staff levels at all levels of sport compared to their male counterparts,” Wells said.

Better pay for female athletes and clearer opportunities for women in sports administration are among the proposals Wells will take to the Federal Government’s jobs and skills summit on Thursday and Friday.

International analysis shows that at Olympic Games before Tokyo 2020, and nearly all other mixed-sex sporting events such as tennis, table tennis, and beach volleyball, the last two events have consistently been the women’s and the men’s finals—in that order.

“Female athletes’ lower visibility perpetuates a vicious cycle of less funding, resources and opportunities,” Gebel said.

“Fortunately, there are signs of hope and progress. For example, at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, organisers considered gender balance in event scheduling and additional efforts, such as introducing new mixed-gender events, were made to improve gender diversity in sport.”

However, he said the final event in all Olympic Games to date had always been the men’s marathon.

“Wouldn’t it be great if in every second future Olympic Games the last event was the women’s marathon?

“Wouldn’t it be great if in the future in every second Wimbledon tournament, and all other Grand Slam events, the women’s final would be the finale?

“Changes like this would send an important message to girls and women around the world that female athletes are not second-class athletes and women are not second-class citizens.”