This speaker pioneer still played records and fended off jealous wives

When the Swiss Football Association (SFV) announced in February that it was looking for stadium speakers for the Women's European Championship in its own country, one hint sparked outrage: The applicants were made aware that they would be providing "unpaid voluntary work."

People committed to equal rights protested. They argued that this cemented a long-outdated gender stereotype and a lack of appreciation. After all, anyone who takes on this role at a men's international match receives financial compensation. An SRF podcast was titled: "Are female speakers discriminated against?"

The SFV tried to calm the situation, admitting there were miscommunications, but defended itself. The association would cover the casting and specific training for the fifteen women, which was worth something. And it offered a perspective. The best candidate would be considered for the speaker job at women's international matches in the future, and the job would be paid. In the two Swiss men's professional leagues, FC Luzern and FC Schaffhausen recently had a female stadium speaker.

Helena Schlegel can only smile wearily at such debates. She and her sister Monika volunteered as stadium speakers at the Espenmoos Stadium from 1976 to 1994, pioneers in this field. And the two of them received two season tickets each from FC St. Gallen as a reward. They couldn't even claim them for themselves, since they were on duty at every home game. So they gave the tickets to their parents.

The sisters only appeared as a pair; they were like two peas in a pod. Helena, with her long, black hair, made the announcements. Monika, with her short, fair hair, was her informant. Both had played for the St. Gallen women's soccer club, founded a few years earlier: Helena as a striker, Monika as a libero. Their speaking engagements made them known throughout the city.

Monika Schlegel has since passed away. Helena Schlegel's greatest hobby these days is her two Amazon parrots – more on why they're quite demanding later. When she welcomes us for an interview, she apologizes. Her parrots are a bit wild when they're allowed out of their cage. That's why one of the pictures hangs crookedly. And she has a black eye; one of the birds pinched her face. Incidentally, this bird is a real talent for languages; it always asks, "Darling, let's go snooze?" He couldn't have had a better teacher than Helena Schlegel, who prefers to keep her age private.

The Schlegel sisters always had plenty to do in the cramped speaker booth – but no internet or cell phones. The Schlegels answered the phone calls to the stadium; there could be more than a hundred during a game. "People called who wanted to know the score. Or jealous wives asking when the match would finally end," Helena Schlegel recounts.

Many times she had to page a doctor who was sitting in the stadium and was now needed elsewhere. Or she told a man that he had become a father and should go to the hospital immediately.

So that FC St. Gallen could earn money, she collected and read out advertising slogans like: "When it comes to meat and sausage, it's soon decided, we'll get it from Schär, for St. Fide!" Or she moderated the halftime game for companies in which they were allowed to shoot penalty shots at a substitute goalie.

She rarely heard any silly comments about trying to compete in a male-dominated world. "At first, everyone stood up to see why a woman's voice was playing. But we were quickly accepted." A fan once gave them a hundred roses.

Someone else asked her why she never told a joke. Schlegel remembered the legendary reporter Karl Erb , whose public speaking course she had attended. He told her: "A public speaker is not a master of ceremonies, but a source of information."

The Schlegel siblings were also the stadium DJs. They distributed flyers for spectators to submit their music requests. This even helped them calm down rowdy fans, as Monika Schlegel told the magazine "Saint Gall" in 2022, shortly before her death. If only fan work were always that easy...

To keep all the hits in stock, the Schlegels acquired a large record collection. They often had to play "Rivers of Babylon" by Boney M. The FC St. Gallen players believed this song would bring them luck.

The Schlegels also performed their duties when the Swiss national team competed in St. Gallen. The association's leaders' biggest concern was that the sisters might hit the wrong groove on the record while playing the national anthems, resulting in the wrong song. So the women went to the record store and asked the owner to record the two anthems they needed onto cassette so they could play them.

It was also the national team that presented the sisters with the most difficult task. In 1997, they visited the FC Goldach amateurs before a World Cup qualifier – and under coach Rolf Fringer , they played without numbers on their backs, presumably in the hope of giving their opponents less clues. The Schlegels, sitting far away from the action, could hardly tell who was scoring the goals. This was a difficult task, especially since Switzerland won 10-0. Monika always went out to find out who had scored the goals.

When FC St. Gallen faced opponents from abroad, Helena Schlegel taught herself the language of that country. To prepare for a team from Kyiv, she watched a language course on television and filled in her crossword puzzles using Cyrillic letters.

She also "spoke" at youth games. And she was amused when South American first-team players appeared in the Espenmoos press box. They weren't primarily interested in watching their youth team, but rather in calling their families back home. If they did so from the press box, the club paid the bill.

The worst slip of the tongue? "We were joking around, and shortly afterward, I promptly said "Fürchtetum" instead of "Principality of Liechtenstein." However, a diplomatic crisis with the small neighboring country never arose.

The Schlegels' era as speakers at FC St. Gallen ended unforgivingly. New people came to the club, and the sisters were supposed to hand over their responsibilities. They would have been left with reading the advertising slogans. "But we didn't want to be just the advertising aunts," says Helena Schlegel. The family atmosphere at the club has been somewhat lost, and they decided against a bouquet of flowers as a farewell. But they have kept all the match programs from the past.

From then on, the Schlegels devoted themselves to their eyewear business – and discovered their love for big-time football. Once, while staying in Barcelona, a "Clásico" between Barça and Real Madrid was taking place. On a whim, they asked at the hotel if they had any tickets left. The answer was: tickets were always reserved for their guests when Barça was playing. And so, from then on, they often spent their holidays at this hotel.

Helena Schlegel wears an FC Barcelona watch and watches every match on TV with her 18-year-old neighbor. Unfortunately, she can hardly make it to Barcelona anymore. "Those parrots!" she says. "I can't leave them alone anymore."