Your Stories

"My favourite years were between 1994 - 1996 with the Isle of Wight Ladies - we were rubbish then but we were such a close-knit team" says Nicky Cook, 40, from Ryde.

"But the best experience I ever had was when I was playing with Ryde.  We were hopeless and had lost 21 games in a row.  Finally we won a game against Portsmouth and it was such an achievement - a real breakthrough - and we partied for 12 hours to celebrate.  They beat us the following week but it didn't matter."

Nicky making a save in 1999 with Ryde Ladies

Another happy memory was being selected for a national league game - playing for Saints against Chelsea.  She had reached her highest level in the sport and was thrilled to play so well in the match.  Being a Portsmouth fan though she admits: "I still wore my Pompey shirt underneath the Saints strip!"

Woman in a man's world

When asked about the women's side of football in comparison to men's Nicky thinks that the sport has made progress.  But it's still a minority sport and not one she's made money from - unlike her male counterparts: "It cost me to play football - I never earned a penny."

The only female team to survive on the Isle of Wight is Shanklin.  Nicky says they remain because "they have some really good players, and the men's team really respect them and include them in the club." 

Nicky revisits Shanklin Football Club

This didn't tend to happen with other clubs earlier in Nicky's career.  Women would get turfed off the pitch mid-game so children could play instead, or the floodlights would get switched off if the women wanted to train.

Hard times

It wasn't this treatment that annoyed her the most in the early days: "Being called a man-hating lesbian and people making assumptions about me has been the worst part of my career.  Just because I'm a tom boy and have short hair doesn't mean people can categorise me and call me names."

There was also a very low point in her life when in 1997 Nicky suffered severe depression, which led her to self-harm.  She was hospitalised and her footballing career was put on hold.  Her husband, Tony, remained strong and stuck by her throughout these troubled and confusing times and, together, they came though it 12 months later.

Nicky remembers: "That summer was extremely difficult for me, as I battled against my illness, without having football as my outlet.  I always found the close season hard, and would count down the days until the season started again.  Add in the depression that was firmly gripping me and it was no surprise I found it hard to cope."

Love of the game

Nicky attended her first football match with her father when she was ten years old.  She was taken to Fratton Park as "the son my father never had" and she's been a fan of Portsmouth and football ever since.

Playing netball and hockey honed her competitive edge and then aged 20, when she was watching her husband play indoor cricket, she spotted a poster advertising women's football training.

Nicky says: "I ended up playing a game with them that weekend - but I only touched the ball three times, and that was twice with my hands - so from then on I was considered a goalie!"

Being in goal wasn't a position Nicky minded and one that she quickly made her own: "What I didn't have in height I made up for with agility and bravery."  She gets annoyed if people assume you can put just anyone in goal: "Goalies are a breed of their own - you need to be mad for a start! But you also need to be skilled."

Playing for the Isle of Wight Ladies team was a dream come true and the start of 20 years of enjoyment and playing for teams all over the South - making a total of 315 appearances in her career.

Game over

Nicky has now retired from the game because "although the mind is willing, the body is not." She thought that giving up would be difficult: "I lived for playing at weekends and I was afraid of retiring, but I've actually taken to it quite well."

IOW Ladies playing at Margate in 1996

What's helped with this transition is using the last 18 months to put together a book of her memories as an amateur female footballer called Should Have Gone To Blackgang Chine.

She has been sourcing old photos (involving many great haircuts!) and contacting old team-mates, who she hasn't seen for over a decade, to help piece together the story of her career and put everything to rest.

She's even got Hope Powell OBE - England's Women's National Coach (1997-2009) to write the foreword of the book and show her total support of Nicky's dedication to the game.

The title of the book is taken from a time where Nicky and a couple of her team-mates considered not bothering with a match and going to Isle of Wight attraction, Blackgang Chine, instead. 

They ended going to the match - but it was a disaster and many of their players ended up injured.  That day, and whenever a wrong decision has been made since, Nicky and her friends have said "We should have gone to Blackgang Chine."