Please be advised of the following confirmed match details:
Game: Stirling University v Aberdeen
Competition: Scottish Women’s Premier League Cup (SWPLC)
Date: Sunday 9th February 2020
Venue: Airthrey Pitches, Stirling University
Kick Off: 1400

The AFC Women’s team begin their season on Sunday when they travel to play Stirling Uni in a League Cup group game. The girls will then play Hearts at home next week in the competition and then Boroughmuir Thistle.

Mark Gordon recently spoke to new signing Amy Strath ahead of the new campaign:

AFC Women’s new signing Amy Strath is delighted to take a break from her footballing travels to come back home. The 23-year-old joined up with Emma Hunter’s squad as they prepare for the new season, having spent time playing in America and Iceland.

“I really missed playing with some of the girls I had played with before. I saw some of the big steps that they had taken by winning the league unbeaten and I really wanted to be a part of that. I think signing here is one of the best decisions I’ve made”.

Central defender Strath started her footballing journey as a youngster with Aberdeen Ladies, where she played with some of the current squad including Kelly Forrest and Loren Campbell. “I’ve played with Aberdeen right from the start, since I was 12 until the day I left. I just worked my way up the age groups and eventually started playing with the ladies’ team where I played with Kelly and Loren. When I was 16, I decided to try something different. I applied for scholarships to play out of the country and that was when America came up”.

Amy combined football and study in the States where she gained valuable experiences both on and off the pitch. “I was in the States for five and a half years. You can play for four years along with your education and then I took on a coaching role so I could stay on and gain an extra degree. I played for a semi-pro team in Kansas, which was incredible. I got to play and travel all over America which was a great experience. One game you were playing in freezing cold conditions and the next it was roasting hot as you travelled between the states”.

In the USA, Strath saw first-hand the differences in how the women’s game has developed compared with back home. “The game is massively different over there in the way the youngest players are coached all the way up. The young players have a pathway from a young age up through College and University and there are so many possibilities of where to develop and take your game. But things are changing here now too”.

The next stop on Amy’s footballing travels came in the form of a spell playing professionally in the Icelandic Premier League with Fylkir.

“I graduated in May. I wasn’t supposed to go back until July, but my coach got in contact and said that there was an agent that was interested. I had posted a highlights video on Facebook and he had seen that and liked it and it just went from there. Two weeks later, I was back home and then about a week after that, I was over in Iceland playing professionally”.

The move to professional football was one which Amy enjoyed, although it came with a lot of extra pressures.

“The hardest part was that it was halfway through their season and my first game was three days after I arrived. It was a lot of pressure moving from playing college football to being professional. There was so much more to it than just playing football – the sponsors, interviews, the pressure to deliver was much greater. It was also a strict routine in terms of training and watching what you eat and how you live. I was playing in front of a couple of thousand people where I was used to playing on front of a couple of hundred in the States so that was a lot of extra pressure too”.

Strath hopes to call on the experiences she gained in America and Iceland in order to help her new team-mates, who she feels can also help her improve as a player.

“I hope I can use some of the things I’ve learned to help the girls here. I’ve learned that it’s not just about how you played in the game but how to develop your movement and mentality.

“Being mentally prepared is important and during the season that’s coming, we need to make sure we’ve got a strong mentality and take each game as it comes. It will be important to be emotionally prepared. It will be tough sometimes, so hopefully my experience will be able to help with that. I also think the girls can help me to improve as there is a lot of good talent in this team and even the young players are impressive and can help push me to be better”.

As her new side make the step up to SWPL2 following their undefeated league winning season, Strath warned that although they are confident, they know the season will be tougher than last year.

“As a team we need to take it one game at a time, we can’t look too far into the season but just concentrate on the next game and keep going game by game. It’s going to be a long season and it’s going to be a hard season, so we need to stick together and stay mentally prepared and strong enough to keep going from week to week. We’re very excited, at training we’re on at each other all the time, but in a positive way, as everyone is trying to get the best out of each other. The league is going to be difficult but the main thing is going to be staying strong mentally. We’ve got the talent and the technique and we’re a really positive squad”.

Good luck to Amy and all the girls this season!