CHANTILLY, France — It’s a beautiful day for football – real football, with touchdowns and quarterbacks and long, spiraling passes – and so the players lace up their cleats and lope onto the fresh-mowed grass.

In the crowd along the sideline – it consists entirely of one Mom and one baby – is a traveler who has come north an hour by railway from Paris to witness the newest Olympic sport of all, not included this year but destined for a global explosion of popularity in 2028 when the Games come to Los Angeles – especially since half the players on the gridiron will be women.