View From The Field: Ward’s Words (Helen Ward column)

Wales’s record goalscorer writes from a strange spring. There was an international camp in February with no game to prepare for and no head coach, which she still found worthwhile, and she is warm about Loren Dykes in staff kit for the first time and about the incoming Gemma Grainger. The anniversary prompts a claim she says her mother rates highly: that she was the very first player to kick a ball in the WSL, kicking off for Chelsea against Arsenal ten years earlier, in a game she admits was no classic on a rock-hard pitch, settled by Gilly Flaherty. She explains a spell on loan at London Bees to stay match fit, her imminent return to Watford for an FA Cup tie, and the curtailed league season.