I wonder how many times Jill Scott and Ellen White privately thought ‘**** this’. As they stood drenched at the side of a busy road waiting to be picked up in a rickety minibus.As they scrambled for hand-me-down equipment when they were actually playing for a ‘professional’ club.
As they were treated to another ignorant comment or unfair comparison.Both retire from their playing careers on the crest of a wave, in a place that would have been seen as pure fantasy when they both first pulled on the Three Lions jersey in 2006 and 2010 respectively.
European champions. Sold-out Wembley. More than 17million in the UK alone watching live.As the eulogies are written on their careers, that afternoon on July 31, 2022 will shout louder than the rest, when Chloe Kelly poked home from close range and the ground seemed to shake a little as I watched from 100 miles away.However, it’s the thousands upon thousands of other days that ensures their place as immortals of English women’s football.Leaving everything out on the pitch, for club or country, only to grab a quick shower and a sneaky nap before heading straight out to their ‘day’ jobs.Writing for the Players Tribune this week, Scott remarked: ‘If you don’t love it, you don’t last.
You can’t. The dream is what sustains you.’It’s a great quote, but talking to myself on BBC5 Live, their former team-mate for club and country, Izzy Christiansen, pointed out that, actually, they were, in their earlier days, ‘chasing a dream that didn’t exist.’She’s right, and it makes the trail Scott and White played such an important role in blazing all the more inspiring.The amount of times they made the same metaphorical run only to yet again be denied the delivery they deserved, even though they