Victory for women’s football:

As the nation watched with pride and admiration as England’s Lionesses lifted the EURO Cup this summer, some of us were in awe for even more personal reasons.

Hannah Smith and myself, Account Manager and Design Head respectively at Blackdog, were squad members of little-known Hertford Town Ladies from 2014 until 2017, back in the days when we had to ask our CEO, Geoff Cash, to buy our kit for us, which he very kindly did. For many years, women’s football was largely self-funded by the players, with the infrastructure to support developing female talent still in its infancy.

I started playing back in 1999 for Romford Ladies FC. Our kit was handed down from the men’s club that we were affiliated with. I’m 5’ 2”, so you can imagine how that looked. That was as far as the support from our male counterparts really went back then. Prior to that there were no girls’ teams to play for and we weren’t even really allowed to play for our school teams.

For Hannah it was much the same – playing in the playground with the boys but no formal team to join. With no opportunities in secondary school, she did manage to play at university, and then nothing for a few years until Hertford was set up in 2014 and started running trials. This coincided with me retiring from my previous team Billericay Town FC and thinking I was ready to put my feet up. Thankfully Hannah convinced me to have one last stab at it and what followed was three more years playing the beautiful game and two league championship titles.

Fast forward to 2022, and after years of hard work and fighting for change, our England Lionesses won that epic final at Wembley Stadium against our old rivals Germany. The enormity of the occasion and the amount of support the team has gained along the way has been felt across the nation, but particularly in the hearts and memories of the women who have gone before. There’s still work to be done when it comes to equality in the sport, but the Lionesses’ victory is a triumph on many levels. Girls can now dream of the biggest prizes in football just like our brothers have been able to for many years now, and for that I am thrilled (if not a little sad that it was too late for me!).

And as I watch my 2-year-old daughter kick her football around the garden, I can’t help but wonder… what if?

Kerry Oldham – Design Head