Issue
February 2021 33 articles indexed
Read She Kicks issue 65 in full
Column / Opinion p.3
Jen O'Neill writes from a third lockdown and a second football shutdown for everyone below the elite, admitting she feels like a broken record. So much had changed since the last issue, she says,…
News pp.4–6
Three home nations lost their head coaches in one cycle: Phil Neville left England early for Inter Miami, with Hege Riise and Rhian Wilkinson appointed interim, while Shelley Kerr and Jayne Ludlow both stepped…
Other p.6
A dated listing of the fixtures and draws scheduled for February and March 2021, published under an unusually frank heading - as currently scheduled - that says a good deal about how the season…
Other p.6
A complete list of the twenty-five transfers into and out of the FA Women's Super League and Championship in the January 2021 window, correct to 24 January with the deadline four days away. It…
News p.7
Northern Ireland made history at Seaview. Having edged Belarus 3-2 days earlier, Kenny Shiels' side fell behind early to Jensa Kannuberg Torolvsdottir's goal for the Faroe Islands and then scored five, through a Rachel…
Interview pp.10–13
Claudia Walker did not score a league goal all last season; this one she has been scoring reels of them, and Birmingham City, widely tipped for relegation, are thriving as underdogs. She credits Carla…
Other p.14
Seven photographs from six weeks of the Barclays FA Women's Super League, spanning the turn of the year and taking in the winter's snow, and presented without a single caption. Each image carries only…
Column / Opinion p.15
Tottenham's defender writes from a third national lockdown, counting the squad fortunate to still be going to work every day and describing the care players are taking to keep the season on the road…
Cover feature pp.16–20
A Manchester City season-ticket holder as a child who now gets the shirt with her own name on it, Esme Morgan is candid about competing with players she says are a level above her…
Interview pp.21–23
There is still an American accent in Joe Montemurro's Arsenal squad three seasons after Heather O'Reilly left, and it belongs to a Swiss defender with more than eighty caps. Noelle Maritz's parents are both…
Interview pp.24–25
Born in Basildon and capped more than a hundred times by New Zealand, Ria Percival takes the magazine's quickfire questionnaire. She describes herself as a workhorse who works hard, does not stop and will…
Cover feature pp.26–29
Described by the Spain coach Jorge Vilda as quick and brave, Ona Batlle came to Manchester United by way of Barcelona B, Madrid CFF and Levante and went straight into the side of a…
Interview pp.30–34
One of the few unambiguous positives of 2020 was Fran Kirby's return to the pitch, and this extended She Kicks a Beat takes the long way round to it. The first album she bought…
Other p.35
Eight photographs from six weeks of the FA Women's Championship, and unlike the WSL gallery earlier in the same issue, every one of them is captioned. Coventry United huddle before kick-off; Liverpool's Kirsty Linnett…
Poster pp.36–37
A double-page poster of Tobin Heath in the Manchester United shirt, mid-stride and captioned only with her name, her number 77 and her two teams, Manchester United and the USWNT. Her arrival at United…
Interview pp.38–39
The second instalment of the magazine's Championship slot, an interview of two halves. Chelsey Jukes is a full-back and a sports therapist, and 2020 was Blackburn Rovers' first season in the Championship - a…
Interview pp.40–44
Sian Williams came to Arsenal after watching a television programme, and stayed to captain them. Born in England to Welsh parents, she played through the WFA National League era alongside Naz Ball, Debbie Bampton,…
Interview pp.45–47
Chloe Logan became a goalkeeper because nobody else would go in goal for a primary-school match against the teachers, and she wanted to play the whole game. She had, by her own account, a…
Run-of-page feature p.48
Nicola Docherty still gets goosebumps talking about the 2019 World Cup, and still cannot quite believe she went to one. The Rangers and Scotland defender was interviewed for Steven Lawther's Arrival, a book about…
Column / Opinion p.49
The SWPL was due to restart on 17 January after the winter break and was postponed to the end of the month at the earliest, a decision Hibernian's captain thinks was right. Travelling the…
Interview pp.50–53
The only South African to have scored at a World Cup was taking the Spanish top flight by storm at SD Eibar, having moved from Benfica when the pandemic cut short a lucrative contract…
Interview pp.54–55
Canada's goalkeeper takes the magazine's regular goalkeepers' questionnaire, and her favourite save is the one she made from Marta when Sky Blue played Orlando Pride. She is careful about the question of what would…
Interview pp.56–59
Northern Ireland's 5-1 win over the Faroe Islands in December took them to a major-tournament play-off for the first time, and their manager has no intention of sitting back. Kenny Shiels came to the…
Interview pp.57–59
The magazine's regular coaches' questionnaire, taken by the manager who had just made Northern Ireland history. His favourite sessions, he says, are designed around what the team needs rather than what he enjoys, and…
Interview pp.60–61
West Ham's captain says she is passionate and has high standards, approachable and understanding, with a door always open for players struggling with anything at all - and that she prides herself on being…
Interview pp.62–63
Aston Villa's midfielder joined the club's regional talent centre at nine and became the first female player to sign professional terms there, at eighteen. Her matchday is built on two fixed points: she has…
Interview pp.63–65
Everton's Norwegian full-back turns the magazine's food questionnaire into an argument for Norwegian tacos, which she has every Friday and which she insists are a genuine national institution rather than a joke. She cannot…
Interview p.64
Bristol City's Welsh defender answers the magazine's regular questions about her car, and the answers turn out to be mostly about the driving. It is a Mercedes A-Class, silver, and she calls the colour…
Interview p.65
Completing what the magazine calls its Cymru double, Cardiff City's 22-year-old Welsh international turns out to be the rarest kind of subject for a kit questionnaire: she owns almost no football shirts at all,…
Interview pp.66–68
Fourteen-year-old Amber Faulkner, who started out in a local boys' team and found focus in football through a difficult period of bullying at school, puts six questions to the forward she has modelled her…
Other p.68
The seventh consecutive instalment of Saving Grace, the strip about a young, football-mad goalkeeper drawn by the magazine's regular cartoonist Steve English. It runs along the foot of the Little Kicks page, sharing the…
Other p.69
Maria O'Brien is eleven, comes from Worthing, trains with the Chelsea Foundation and plays for Worthing United Under-11 Girls - and describes herself as 50 per cent Arsenal and 50 per cent Fulham, which…
Other p.70
The issue's puzzle page runs its two established games. Spot the Difference uses a United States training session and what the magazine calls a super sextet - Sam Mewis, Lynn Williams, Carli Lloyd, Lindsey…
