Sports Minister Helen Grant MP has caused a storm after comments were made in an interview for the Telegraph about women choosing more feminine sports.

Andy Reed said "I can see what the Minister was trying to say. We know from the research that not everybody enjoys or wants to play traditional sports and other entry points are important. Unfortunately the debate has been sidetracked by the comments about looks and feminine V non-feminine sport.

In the interview Grant said

"I think we ultimately need a behavioural change," agrees Ms Grant. "I think we need to get to the point where women's sport is looked on and regarded as equal to the men's game. When we get to that point that's when we get the balanced coverage.

"To get to that point, we need certainly the media to do more, we need more finance, more businesses getting involved through sponsorship and we needs sports governing bodies and others and schools to be very innovative with ways to get our girls involved."

Ms Grant believes the real way to change sexist mindsets, and get more women into sport, is obvious. It isn't about trying to force women to take up football, play netball in schools or join their local swimming club; it's about asking grown women what they want.

What do women want?

"We really need to take a step back and actually ask women what they want and give it to them," she says. "That can be whether it's a Zumba class or a game of Rounders after they've dropped the kids off. That's the approach we need to take – what works for them.

"It's having a good spread on offer. For example some girls may well not like doing very traditional hockey, tennis or athletics, others might, so for those who don't want to, how about considering maybe gym, ballet, cheerleading? It's not just schools, it's clubs, it's being innovative. Actually looking at our women and our girls and asking, what do they want?"

Andy Reed continued "We think Helen Grant was making a valid point about the need for greater choice for all in delivering increased participation but that has been lost. We will be posting a few blogs and viewpoints from our readers over the weekend"