Toughest in Lincoln
I would like to begin by saying I am officially the toughest player in Lincoln ladies!!! My reasoning for this is when we played Birmingham 4 weeks ago I hurt my ribs, I have continued to play even though it has only been half pace and then on Tuesday after our fitness testing I had a scan and found out I have broken not only 1 rib but 2, so Lukey boy surely an award must be on the cards for me at the end of the season. As I mentioned earlier we had fitness testing on Tuesday with England it’s the last one before the 21 players are selected for the world cup. We have to complete various tests they include speed, agility, speed endurance (absolute killer) and the yoyo test (also a killer), depending on our results our sports scientist then designs a programme for us to follow so we can improve on all aspects. The day was full of many incidents obviously the main one being my broken ribs ( Im not sure I have told you enough yet) then during the yoyo one of my team mates in the next lane to me decided to projectile vomit so I had to run around that yuuuk mentioning no names (Garfield) and then as I was walking out chatting to a few of the girls my front tooth fell out, I couldn’t even style it out, I left them on the floor crying with laughter, why couldn’t it have waited until I got in the car!!!
The next day was much more fun I travelled to London to do some radio interviews with Graeme Le Saux to help to promote the Champions league finals both men’s and women’s. He was such a lovely guy and great to see a male footballer really interested in the women’s game.
We had another confidence boosting win with England last week; we played Sweden who is ranked 5th in the world at Oxford United ground and managed to win the game 2-0. We didn’t play as well as we know we can do in the first half however second half was an excellent performance and we have to carry that on in to the world cup finals. There were 24 in the squad and Hope has to now make a decision and get rid of 3 players before the world cup so please keep your fingers crossed for myself Casey, jess and Soph.
Last Sunday was the FA cup final at Coventry City’s ground sadly I wasn’t playing but I did get asked by sky to do the co-commentary, the game was between Arsenal and Bristol academy. The FA cup is always a highlight of the women’s season and this year it drew in 13,000 spectators, Arsenal came out victorious but Bristol made it difficult and if they had converted some of their chances it may have been a different game. I did the commentary with a guy called Tony Jones he was amazing, very knowledgeable and articulate on the other hand I said a few corkers commenting on Emma Byrne the Arsenal goalkeepers pink kit saying how much I liked it, then the little scuffle between 2 players saying, “it’s ok its only handbags” (maybe I should have kept both of these to myself) Also I may have said you know a few too many times, being a scouser it was either that or eeeerrrrrmm!!!