Kylie Murphy: I wish I was coming into the game now

Kylie Murphy remembers changing beside "rat-infested" containers in the early stages of her football career.

The 33-year-old Wexford Youths star says she appreciates the recent improvements in the women's game all the more because of those chastening early-career experiences, even if it does make her long to be a young player starting out all over again.

Murphy was crowned the 2021 SSE Airtricity/Soccer Writers Ireland Personality of the Year on Wednesday, and used the occasion to reflect on the women's domestic game in this country.

Her synopsis in short: a lot done, plenty more still to do.

"I would love to be those [younger] girls now coming through," she said.

"What they are coming into is incredible, you can see what is coming for them. Ellen [Molloy, her Wexford Youths team-mate] is what 16, 17 years of age? The pitches they are playing on and the dressing-rooms they are getting changed in... when I was their age, I was getting changed in the boot of a car or those old box containers that were literally rat-infested. You would be afraid to leave your clothes down.

"That is what I was getting changed in when I was 16.

"Maybe in a way, it makes me appreciate all of these things so much more, where the sport has grown to. There are so many opportunities out there for young girls coming now if they put it in. The talent is always there but I always feel that if you have it upstairs, you have it in abundance.

"And I see that in the likes of Ellen and Aoibheann [Clancy]. They are so clued-in and their talent is amazing but they have it upstairs as well. The world is their oyster.

"I would be a bit envious. Even though I am so happy for them and for all of those girls coming up, yeah I wish I was about 10 years of age right now