Hi Andrew, interesting post of yours. Some points you may be interested in. At present, girls football is achieving huge growth at present. My younger foster daughter Lacie, joined about a year ago when she was under 9's level. He year had 1 team and they were just starting a second team of whom Lacie now plays for. Both the first and 2nd team are in the highest division at Under 10's level. We now have had to add a third team to allow growth, and this is happening in other years too. So in the current Under 10's this season, we have the Red Kites, Black Kites and now the White Kites. They are three very good teams and the girls love playing football and are also close friends off the pitch too. They were all parading round the pitch at half time, and it was a joy to watch them tearing onto the pitch after the ladies game as they really look up to both the Under 23's and the Women's first team. The elder girls also made a big fuss of them, carrying some of the much younger girls, and you could see the admiration and aspirations of the younger girls. It had me very close to tears as I watched from the main stand.
My point is, I cannot thank the club enough for what they have done to welcome Brooke and Lacie to the club. When they came with me to watch, I told them that this is not only my club, but their club too. Lacie sprained her wrist last week and was not able to play. When she found out she was unable to play her game she cried her eyes out for 15 minutes. In the end I had to take her to watch her teammates play, and she insisted on standing with her coach! Lacie meets the players for autographs and sometimes a chat after the games, she also met the ex Arsenal and England player Alex Scott the other week. We all idolise our players as much as any United or City fan, but the thing I love about non-league is pour players play because of a deep love of the game and I hope they enjoy mixing with fans as we do with them. You cannot do that a United or City, but you can here. Plus, they play lovely football and you cannot say we don't get our money's worth!!