Jill Scott: We played on pitches that weren't always lit and trained in car parks

"I remember thinking then, women's football has already won," beams Jill Scott, recalling the moment she arrived at Wembley Stadium for the Euro 2022 final. 

The former Lioness was part of the England team that captured the nation's hearts and changed the course of women' football forever when they beat Germany 2-1 three summers ago.

Their first order of business was to demand that girls and boys have equal access to football, but the eventual reach of their success superseded all expectations. 

Since their victory, there have been multi-million pound media coverage deals made to show women's football, attendance for Women’s Super League (WSL) games has grown by 267%, and over 400,000 new opportunities have been created in grassroots football activities. 

"I think it will always be the best day of my life because it was something that I'd wanted so badly for the sport," Scott exclusively tells 90min. "Whenever I sign something for a young girl, I always write 'dream big' on it because nobody can take that dream away from them now."

UEFA’s Unstoppable campaign 

The midfielder announced her retirement from football shortly after England were crowned champions of Europe, but remained committed to growing the women's game even more.

Her most recent project is with UEFA and their new women's football strategy - Unstoppable. The governing body unveiled a package of exciting plans this month to create a future for the next generation of players, coaches, referees, volunteers and fans, starting by investing €1bn (£830m) into women's football. 

"It means so much to me to be a part of something like this," explains Scott. "Especially, when I look back on my career and what UEFA did for me. I played in four European tournaments and when I did, those were the moments I felt like a professional footballer. I always looked up to male role models, like David Beckham and Steven Gerrard, because at that time there weren't many female role models that we could physically see. 

"They want all women and girls to have an opportunity to play football and that makes me smile, because that's not something I had."

The campaign builds on the success of UEFA's previous strategy that was launched in 2019, Time for Action. As part of their new venture, they've outlined four main priorities for the next six years, including:

• To make football the most-played team sport for women and girls in every European country, through developing football pathways for players, coaches and referees alongside grassroots opportunities

• To make Europe the home of the world's top players, with six fully professional leagues and 5,000 fully professional players across the continent

• To make football the most sustainable and investable women's sport, with record-breaking UEFA competitions

• To ensure women's football is celebrated for its unique values and community, where everyone believes that they can have a place

Before signing for Manchester City, Scott began her senior career at Sunderland at a time when the facilities for women in football were so far removed from what they have become for top-flight clubs. 

However, despite such challenging conditions, Scott wouldn’t change her experiences that ultimately helped her "become the player she is today".

"I remember when I first started playing for Sunderland, we trained on pitches that weren't always lit up and did shuttle runs in car parks," she recalls. "I do think that made me into the player I became. I've always said that I wasn't the best player, but I had a good engine and a good work rate that came from the trouble of not being able to find pitches and having to do a lot of running sessions."

As well as this, Scott says safety was one of the biggest challenges for her when she first began playing football. "There were some moments that we couldn’t even get a football out because it just wasn't safe, so we'd just go to the beach and run, but I do like to look on the positive side and those sessions made us adaptable," she says. "It wasn't anyone’s fault, it was rather what was just available to us. 

"Our training sessions would usually be the last one, late at night between 20:00 to 22:00, so when you are a young girl having to make your way there and back on a bus, it isn't always the safest."

The Euro 2022 'spectacle'

But fast forward nearly 20 years and the state of women's football is now unrecognisable. When looking back on the moment that changed it all, Scott tells 90min that she's still in disbelief. 

"It's so hard to put that time into words," she says. "It's like everything that you ever wanted in the last 30 years, and I don't just mean the gold medal, it was the fact that 90,000 people came to Wembley Stadium to watch England Women in a final.

"The gold medal was the icing on the cake but going to Wembley that day, I remember thinking to myself, we've already won - look at this spectacle. I still get goosebumps even now when I think about it."

The Lionesses went from strength to strength as they progressed through the tournament, beating Spain 2-1 in the quarter-finals before thrashing Sweden 4-0 in the semi-final, but Scott says at the time the team didn't have time to think about the wider repercussions of their success.

"We didn't actually think about what we were doing for women's football at the time because we were in our little bubble," she explains. "Our focus was just to train hard and enjoy the journey.

"I know it sounds cliche, but everybody was just having a good time. Sarina [Wiegman] always told us to clap the crowd before the game but it was hard not to block them out and focus on the game, but it was the crowds that helped us win. I remember thinking at Wembley, there's no way I'm letting 90,000 people go away disappointed."

Although the Lionesses were the ones fortunate enough to reap the rewards, Scott is conscious to shine a light on how the victory was in fact for all the players who came before them.

"There were so many from the generations before us that didn't get to play for England and they would've been good enough to," she says. "We felt like we grabbed that baton right at the end and took the team over the finish line, but it felt like it was a big, long relay race and we were just the lucky ones at the end."

What’s next for women’s football?

For the first time ever, the WSL and Championship are under ownership of a new professional body known as the Women's Professional Leagues Limited (WPLL).

Scott says a move like this is "so important" because they are "putting women's football at the forefront and helping give leagues investment" and supporting teams like Reading, whose financial difficulties saw them request to withdraw from the Championship.

"It can be easy to say that everything is great, but we all know there is lots of work to be done," she continues. "We all know the story of Reading, and we don't want to see teams that can't keep going how they were aiming to go as a full-time professional team. These stories do exist and it shows there is still work to be done and having independent support is only going to make the leagues better.

"I always think, when you look at Arsenal, Chelsea or Manchester City - you are only as strong as your foundation and that is the grassroots and the lower leagues. We need to make it all a strong unit as we don't want these teams running away and creating a gap, otherwise it's not going to work. 

"They [WPLL] have put a lot of time and effort into finding things out, speaking to clubs and players and leaving no stone unturned, in terms of how we can make it better. I'm excited to see how this kind of investment goes because it will help the game become more sustainable, when it has lacked a bit of support in the past."

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