Algeria women footballers wave red card at stigma When Fathia was seven years old, she would wait each day for classes to end, throw down her schoolbag and rush to play football with the boys from her neighbourhood. Now in her twenties, Algerian international Fathia plays for all-female club Afak Relizane, where love for "the beautiful game" has trumped gender stereotypes and even militant threats in the conservative yet football-mad North African nation. .