Carney Raring to Go

Karen Carney talks to Tony Leighton after two and a half months out of the game. Her 62nd-minute appearance against Turkey in November was her first football since England’s European Championship final defeat by Germany in Finland, and it proved pivotal: the Chicago Red Stars winger’s fresh legs helped turn a goalless stalemate into a comfortable-looking 3-0 win. Carney is modest about it, saying she did not expect to play any part but loves getting on the pitch, and explains she took four weeks off after the final, then picked up a slight injury and had not kicked a ball for a fortnight beforehand. She now looks ahead to World Cup qualifiers against Austria and Spain, rating Spain the toughest test, and warns against arrogance: England put themselves on the map in 2009, she says, but everybody else is improving too, so no team can be taken for granted.