Latest news with #EllenWhite
BBC News
5 days ago
- Sport
- BBC News
Football Daily James makes England squad & Esme Morgan LIVE
Available for 29 days Eleanor Oldroyd is joined by Ellen White, Steph Houghton and Vicki Sparks. They react to Sarina Wiegman's England squad announcement ahead of UEFA Women's Euro 2025. Hear from the England head coach and defender Esme Morgan joins the pod LIVE. 01:35 Who's in and who's out? 07:20 Sarina Wiegman explains her decisions 11:05 England defender Esme Morgan LIVE 20:50 England's squad culture 28:55 Lauren James worth taking 30:30 'No crisis' despite notable absentees 32:40 Wendie Renard doesn't make France squad 33:55 Ellen & Steph's England XIs 35:15 Will Hannah Hampton be under pressure? BBC Sounds / 5 Live commentaries: Sat 1700 Andorra v England Men in World Cup Qualifying, Tue 1945 England Men v Senegal in Friendly.
BBC News
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Football Daily Women's Football Weekly: Nations League reaction and Kirby announces England retirement
Ellen White and Ben Haines are joined by former England number one Karen Bardsley and react to the news that Fran Kirby has announced her retirement from international football with immediate effect, just days after goalkeeper Mary Earps also retired from international football before England attempt to defend their Euros title. Ellen shares her memories of playing with Fran and Karen reflects on her impact both on and off the pitch. The team also react to the Lionesses failing to reach the semi-finals of the Women's Nations League with a 2-1 defeat by group winners Spain, a game in which substitute Claudia Pina showed her class. They also look ahead to Thursday 5th June when Sarina Wiegman will name her final 23-player squad for the tournament this summer. Who are the players giving her biggest headaches and will she take a gamble on Lauren James? TIMECODES: 1:10 - Fran Kirby announces her international retirement with immediate effect. 3:20 - Ellen White and Karen Bardsley react to Kirby calling time on her international career. 16:30 - Reaction to the Lionesses 2-1 defeat to Spain in the Women's Nations League. 23:35 - The competition to start at number 9 between Alessia Russo and Aggie Beever-Jones. 25:35 - Post-match reaction from Alessia Russo. 29:25 - Should Sarina Wiegman take Michelle Agyemang to the Euros alongside Russo and Beever-Jones? 31:50 - Post-match reaction from Leah Williamson 34:10 - Look ahead to the England squad announcement for the Euros. 39:50 - Ellen and Karen's squad announcement stories.
BBC News
30-05-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Mary Earps: England goalkeeper's journey to the top and the legacy she leaves behind
"She changed goalkeeping. She changed the game. But she hasn't changed."It takes just 11 words for former England team-mate Ellen White to neatly sum up the impact of Mary Earps in a new BBC Sport she is saying, there's something about Mary it's something that'll be felt long after the shock international retirement and the subsequent negative headlines, announced this the peripatetic days bouncing around a handful of clubs and juggling six part-time jobs in the amateur women's football era to juggling endorsements galore as a one-person global lying in an inconsolable heap on the kitchen floor barely able to speak after being dropped by then-England boss Phil Neville in 2020 to finding her voice to take on sportswear giant lastly, perhaps most long-lastingly, helping to flip the perception of women's goalkeeping on its presence on the pitch and her prescience off it - a willingness to embrace TikTok is widely credited with her huge popularity - has helped make Earps an unstoppable week's retirement is not a full stop of of the 32-year-old's stated reason for stepping back from international football is to concentrate on her club career - she's currently at Paris the end of an international era inevitably leads to questions about legacy."The legacy I want to leave is leaving the game in a better place," she says."That's what it's always been. To try to leave women's goalkeeping in a better place than it was."I think in more recent times what's been added to that is to make goalkeeping cool."I just think representation matters – you can't be what you can't see and hopefully I can represent to people a goalkeeper, but also somebody who's been through a lot and who is still standing, still swinging. Hopefully I can encourage others to do the same." Anyone looking for a source of encouragement from Earps' career has plenty to go changing the game seemed a million miles away when the Nottingham-born keeper started a series of in-depth interviews for documentary Mary Earps: Queen of Stops, Earps and her family open up about that journey to the top of her sport – and some of the big decisions en a goalkeeper was a no-brainer. "From my very first game I knew I wanted to be a goalkeeper," she says of an opening match between her side West Bridgford Colts and Hucknall Town. "There was a penalty given against us and I saved it. My dad said, in typical dad fashion, 'see, if one of the other girls was in goal they wouldn't have saved that' and for me, that was it.""I always knew she'd be good," her brother Joel says. "Something my dad tried to get her to do was to try to develop into a goalkeeper with attributes that weren't really a part of the women's game then. A goalkeeper that was good with her feet. A goalkeeper that would come out and collect the ball well."But despite her father's high standards, Earps was taking her first footballing steps in a radically different era.A 17-year-old Earps made her senior debut for Doncaster Belles in the inaugural season of the Women's Super League in 2011. At that time her match fee was £ the time the WSL turned professional in 2018, Earps already had eight teams on her footballing resume."I think my Wikipedia page probably looks a bit colourful when you look at all the teams I've played for but that was kind of the reality back then," Earps amateur status at that time meant that players were juggling travel - "three, four or five hours to a WSL club", remembers Earps – and a day job, around football. Earps burned the midnight oil more than most – at one time she had six part-time jobs, including working at a toy shop and a a result, her career was at a crossroads when she graduated with a degree in information management and business studies from Loughborough University in 2016."My fears were [the women's game] wasn't sustainable," she says. "The infrastructure for women's football was not going to allow it to go anywhere."Going to university was definitely always the plan and when I graduated I thought 'well, I can either go for something that I really want, or, I can try and make a living'. It felt like it was worth taking a bit of a shot and a bit of a gamble on my football career and myself."Earps will no doubt take some time now to look back and reflect on how that gamble has paid part of Earps' impressive skill has been her ability to make and advocate for change in real time. On multiple occasions during her career she has spoken up for the need for specific goalkeeping coaches, something she didn't have access to when starting out. Earps' international career was very nearly over before it had a scene in the BBC Sport documentary Lionesses: Champions of Europe in which Earps describes the impact England coach Sarina Wiegman has had on her clicks her fingers to the lens as she describes a Sarina Sliding Doors-style shift, saying: "Sarina came in and life changed, literally like that. Drop of a dime."Aged 28, she had been in a two-year international exile prior to Wiegman's arrival in September 2021. She had played her last game under Neville two years earlier against Germany at she found out via Instagram in March 2020 that she'd been dropped by Neville she hit rock bottom. "It felt like my world was ending," she remembers. "I opened my phone getting ready to scroll over lunch and yeah, I wasn't in the squad. I'd not had an email, not had a call, not a text, no notification from anyone."That was the moment where I was in pieces on the kitchen floor."In piecing together any story on the impact or legacy of Earps on women's football, one thing is almost Wiegman's appointment, her journey to winning the Euros and twice being voted the world's best goalkeeper wouldn't have recollections of her and Wiegman's first conversation illuminate one of the other ways she's changed the game – through her strength of their bond and instant connection also offers insight into Wiegman's reported frustration, external at Earps' retirement this week."The first conversation (with Sarina) was really emotional," Earps says. "It was tears and surprise and vulnerability and I don't think I had ever really shared that vulnerability with a manager before."It was strange for me that that happened within a few minutes of talking."She was very clear from the start: 'This is your opportunity, it's up to you what you do with it'." 'I'm going to do it the Mary Earps way' "She just needed someone to believe in her," former Manchester United and England team-mate Alessia Russo the pitch Earps drew on the pain of her England exile and began the journey towards the record-breaking goalkeeper she would become."It happened at the same time as me figuring out who I was as a person and being like, no, this is who I am. I don't want to be somebody else," she says."And it's the same as a goalkeeper."This is what I think I'm good at. Communication. I'm an organiser. Trying to influence the game in certain ways."I'm not going to try and do something I'm not good at like stand on the halfway line like Manuel Neuer would do, because that's not who I am. I'm going to try and do it the Mary Earps way."Off the field, the darker times also helped evolve the Mary Earps way, sparking a revolution in her attitude to mental health, which has had as much of an impact on the women's game and its fanbase as her prowess in goal."It's become a massive part of who I am now, to be more vulnerable and to be more present," she zenith of that new-found vulnerability came at arguably the pinnacle of her February 2023, the Manchester United keeper was voted the world's best goalkeeper at Fifa's awards after inspiring England to their first major women's title at Euro acceptance speech garnered as many headlines as her said the award was for "anyone who's ever been in a dark place" and added: "Sometimes success looks like this – collecting trophies – sometimes it's just waking up and putting one step in front of the other." Nike campaign was 'brave and inspiring' A year later she won the award again, as well as being named the BBC's Sport Personality of the Year, after saving a penalty as the Lionesses narrowly lost the World Cup final to Spain."Even when she won Fifa Best Goalkeeper for a second time, she was still the same Mary in training the next day. The Mary who wanted to be better than the day before."Former Manchester United and England team-mate Ella Toone reveals a crucial reason behind Earps' incredible career - the steeliness that exists alongside the Lucy Bronze recounts an instructive conversation long before Earps was established as England's first choice."I remember her saying, 'I know I have got what it takes to be No. 1'," Bronze says. "She had that belief."Sportswear brand Nike felt the full force of said steeliness in the run-up to the 2023 World Cup when they initially made the decision not to put Earps' replica goalkeeper jersey on spoke combatively about the decision on the eve of the tournament – putting herself in the centre of a media storm and also adding an additional burden in a high-profile tournament for which both she and the Lionesses were already in the spotlight given they were among the comments led to a petition, garnering more than 150,000 signatures and a sharp U-turn by Nike."You always see young people want to be strikers and score the goals but Mary sets the tone for being a goalkeeper and how important that can be too," Russo says."To start that campaign was really powerful but also really brave and inspiring to do while you're about to play one of the biggest tournaments of your lives." Once more with Earps, much like her retirement this week, it reflects her uncompromising says she felt compelled to speak because the Nike standpoint was "telling a whole demographic of people that they're not important, that the position they play isn't important".She added: "I did feel the pressure but, regardless of how I performed, it was basically a simple moral question of… if you get asked that question and you don't answer it honestly, and you have a fantastic tournament or you have a bad tournament, when you look at yourself in the mirror, after your career is done, what are you going to think?""What if I'd have said it after the tournament? It wouldn't have been as powerful."Powerful, unapologetic pre-tournament statements – sound familiar?Perhaps Earps' iconic international career was destined to end this the full documentary, Mary Earps: Queen of Stops, on BBC iPlayer now and on BBC One on 2 July at 22:40 BST.
BBC News
28-05-2025
- General
- BBC News
Earps retires - where does that leave England?
England's preparations for the European Championship this summer have suffered a blow with the news of Mary Earps' international 32-year-old had been the Lionesses' undisputed starting goalkeeper since 2021, but recently found herself ousted by Chelsea's Hannah Hampton expected to start in goal at Euro 2025 in Switzerland this summer, Earps announced her immediate retirement on Tuesday, just five weeks before the start of the decision leaves Sarina Wiegman and her squad in an unexpected situation. So where do they go from here? Where does this leave England? Nobody was exepecting Earps to retire at this stage, not least England manager admitted she was "disappointed" by Earps' decision, having hoped she would play an "important role" this team-mates only found out on Monday when they reported for upcoming Nations League games against Portugal and Spain. She did not train and returned home."I don't think any of us saw that coming. I'm in shock really," Euro 2022 winner Ellen White told BBC Radio 5 Live's Women's Football Weekly."It's so close to the Euros. I don't really know what to say because it is just crazy. It's surprising with the timing and how close it is to the Euros."Whether Earps would have played in Switzerland or not, her absence will surely have a significant impact on the squad. "She's a huge character, a leader in the team, so she is going to be a big loss," added White."One thing that I know about Mary, when the team is at a low point or in a tournament when sometimes the emotions dip, she brings a lot of energy when it's needed," England midfielder Keira Walsh 53 caps, Earps helped England win Euro 2022 and reach the final of the 2023 World Cup, and has twice been named the best women's goalkeeper in the world."She's a fantastic person, a fantastic goalkeeper. Without her there would have been no Euros win for the Lionesses," fellow Euros-winner Jill Scott told BBC manager Wiegman is now left with a lack of experience in the goalkeeping department as two of the three remaining in the squad - Manchester City's Khiara Keating and Anna Moorhouse of Orlando Pride - have no senior caps. 'Hampton is England's number one... there's no question about it' There remain unanswered questions regarding Earps' decision to retire, but one thing is clear - Hampton is England's number 24-year-old has been limited to 13 caps since making her senior debut in 2022, partly because she was dropped from the squad in later that year because of attitude concerns, and due to Earps' season Hampton played a key role in Chelsea winning a domestic treble, while she has started England's last three games ahead of Earps, including an impressive 1-0 win against Spain at Wembley."She is England's number one, there is no question about it," said White."I think it does leave her to have a lot of pressure on her shoulders now. It feels like she has to be flawless now, and Hannah has got that in her."She has got a hell of a lot of [club] experience, she is an unbelievable goalkeeper."Scott felt that Earps "would have challenged Hannah," irrespective of who ended up starting England's Euros opener against France on 5 July."I've known her since she was 16 at Birmingham," said White."I feel so excited for her and I feel like she is ready to prove to the world that she is one of the best goalkeepers." Who's next up? The obvious worry for Wiegman is what to do should Hampton suffer an injury or pick up a suspension during the City's Keating is likely the next in line, though she is yet to earn a senior cap and has endured an inconsistent starting all 22 of City's Women's Super League matches last season and winning the WSL Golden Glove award, this term the 20-year-old had to share game time with summer signing Ayaka performance levels dropped significantly as she made several errors, including two in a 4-2 home defeat to Manchester Hampton, her distribution is among the strongest in the - also uncapped - is the other goalkeeper currently in Wiegman's 30-year-old Orlando Pride goalkeeper received her first senior call-up last July having never represented England at youth previously played for Durham, Doncaster Rovers Belles, Arsenal and West Ham, Moorhouse left French side Bordeaux to join Orlando in 2022, where she won the NWSL Shield and the NWSL Championship last season. Roebuck the wildcard option Ellie Roebuck could be a wildcard option should Wiegman want to add some experience to her goalkeeping has endured a turbulent couple of years - after falling out of favour at Manchester City under then-manager Gareth Taylor, the 25-year-old suffered a stroke after agreeing to join Roebuck made a full recovery, she has made just two league appearances since joining the Catalan club last 11 England caps she is more experienced than both Keating and Moorhouse, though her last call-up came in October retirement could see her come in from the cold. Head here to get involved
BBC News
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Football Daily Women's Football Weekly: Earps, Corsie & glory for the Gunners
Ellen White and Ben Haines are at St Georges Park and react to the shock announcement that England goalkeeper Mary Earps is retiring from international football. Ellen shares her view on why now but they also reflect on what Mary did for the women's game and its profile, particularly for goalkeepers. Niamh Charles and Keira Walsh share their memories of playing with Mary and her impact off the pitch. They also look ahead to England's next Nations League games against Portugal and Spain as the Euros approaches. Ellen and Ben also talk Arsenal winning the Champions League and how Renee Slegers masterminded that huge victory over Barcelona. Plus Jen Beattie has caught up with her former teammate and Scotland captain Rachel Corsie who has announced her retirement from football this week. Rachel won 154 caps for Scotland and led her country out at their first ever World Cup in 2019 and is part of the Scotland camp for their next Nations League fixtures against Austria and the Netherlands. 00:20 Intro 01:36 Mary Earps retires from England 04:10 Earps statement 10:28 Arsenal win the Champions League! 15:50 How did Arsenal do it? 20:35 Niamh Charles 25:00 Keira Walsh 32:30 Rachel Corsie with Jen BBC Sounds / 5 Live commentaries next weekend: Wed 2000 Real Betis v Chelsea in the UEFA Conference League Final Fri 1945 England v Portugal in the UEFA Women's Nations League Sat 2000 PSG v Inter Milan in the UEFA Champions League Final
