Recently, Mary Earps\u2019 hands have been as busy lifting awards as they have been saving shots and claiming crosses.<\/p>\n
In the past year, the Manchester United star has been named England Women’s Player of the Year, become a FIFA Women’s World Cup\u2122 and WSL Golden Glove winner, been crowned BBC Sports Personality of the Year and, of course, won The Best FIFA Women’s Goalkeeper award… twice!<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been\u201d, the Lionesses keeper told FIFA.com with a smile, \u201ca bit ridiculous really\u201d.<\/p>\n
This sense of delight and wonder is heightened by the fact that, as Earps alluded to in her winner\u2019s speech, it hasn\u2019t always been this way. Flash back to September 2020, and there was an England squad announced with four goalkeepers \u2013 none of which were her.<\/p>\n
Having been in international exile for some time already, she read the news on social media, sunk to her kitchen floor and wept. Earps had, she decided, \u201creached her limits\u201d. \u201cI had given football a good go, but wasn’t quite good enough,\u201d was the now-remarkable conclusion reached. \u201cI had responsibilities, I had a mortgage and it wasn’t adding up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now, of course, that keeper who \u201cwasn\u2019t quite good enough\u201d is a national heroine and a history-maker in her position. By retaining her title as The Best FIFA Women\u2019s Goalkeeper in London on 15 January, she became the award\u2019s first-ever two-time winner.
\nThere was extra weight, therefore, to those words in her speech: \u201cIf you\u2019re struggling and going through hell, keep going!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s not something I want to harp on about,\u201d she said after collecting her award. \u201cI\u2019ve just had so many people approach me to say how amazing it is that I spoke up about it and that they are sharing the same struggles, and I think it’s really important to be honest.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s very easy to pretend like our lives are just these unbelievable shiny things, all sunshine and rainbows, and that’s just not realistic.\u201d<\/p>\n
As impressive as her speech was, Earps used her interview with FIFA to issue a heartfelt apology for forgetting to thank family and friends: \u201cI feel like an idiot. I just can\u2019t do this standing up in front of people!\u201d<\/p>\n
Addressing a packed Hammersmith Apollo has, she said, been infinitely more nerve-wracking than the penalty she faced \u2013 and, typically, saved \u2013 in the Women\u2019s World Cup final. “Oh, definitely,” she responded instantly. “For a penalty, I\u2019m geared up and in the zone. This just feels totally out of my comfort zone.”<\/p>\n
All these awards are, at least, affording the Manchester United star extra practice in the art of public speaking. Yet it was notable and endearing that, as she made history as the first player to win this honour more than once, Earps herself remained completely unaware.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo? You\u2019re joking! That is absolutely unbelievable and I\u2019m truly, truly privileged,\u201d was her response to discovering the news. \u201cIf anything, it just feels even more special [to win it for a second time].<\/p>\n
“To maintain a level of success and consistency is one of the hardest things you can do in football. People always say getting to the top is hard, but staying there is so much harder. And I’m honestly so, so grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Recently, Mary Earps\u2019 hands have been as busy lifting awards as they have been saving shots and claiming crosses. In the past year, the Manchester United star has been named England Women’s Player of the Year, become a FIFA Women’s World Cup\u2122 and WSL Golden Glove winner, been crowned BBC Sports Personality of the Year […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":929161,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20966],"tags":[9648,27192],"class_list":["post-929160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fifa-news","tag-fifa","tag-fifa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/929160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=929160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/929160\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/929161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=929160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=929160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=929160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}