Peskett: I Want to Get to the Top With Town
Thursday, 21st Nov 2024 17:35 by Asif Burhan

After a dazzling start to the season, Ipswich Town's first-ever professional women's player, Sophie Peskett, tells Asif Burhan she feels she can realise her dreams of reaching the very top of the game with the Blues.

Last season Peskett was voted the FA Women's National League Player of the Season on the basis of the ratings of opposition coaches during the campaign. She registered a total of 12 goals and 20 assists including strikes in the team's first league match at Portman Road and the opening goal in the FA Cup tie against FA Women's Championship front runners Charlton Athletic.

So far during this campaign, Peskett has taken her game to new levels, top-scoring for the club with 14 goals in just 13 games.

She says she can't really identify what has gone right for her this term. “I haven't really changed anything. I think sometimes when you're in form and things are going well, it seems to just fall to you.

“Potentially some of the out of position work that we've all been doing has been helping. Having better players around me to create more chances has helped as well.

“I can't put my finger on one thing that I've changed but I think it just happens, it just seems to be falling to me and I've been taking the opportunities that I've been getting.”

As a schoolkid, Peskett was described by her coach Hayley Wood-Thompson as having “the fastest feet in the game”. Therefore it is no surprise that Peskett looks up to the tricky wingers in the current England team.

“More recently I've liked Chloe Kelly. She's a great player, really technical,” she said.

"Equally with Lauren Hemp, I played against her in the FA Cup a few years back and I was amazed by how quick she was physically, and technically, just how sharp she was.

“Players like that are always people that I'll watch clips of, really look up to and strive to be where they are one day.”

After years of being known as a club with a strong tradition of developing young players, Ipswich Town have departed from their usual recruitment policy this summer by signing experienced forwards from the higher leagues.

Peskett believes it to be a statement of intent from the club in their commitment to ensure they are promoted into the second tier after successive campaigns in which they agonisingly fell just short.

“One hundred per cent,” she adds. “It was just a big investment bringing players from higher leagues just meant that we brought bundles of experience and different opinions, which has been really useful.

“We're still a very young team but they're a little bit older than myself so are able to bring so much more and have so much quality about them. It's been really good.”

Over the summer, the club exercised their option to extend Peskett’s contract for another season. Her irrepressible form has not gone unnoticed and amid interest from Women's Super League clubs, her long-term future may be outside Suffolk unless Ipswich match her ambition and move up to the next level.

“I want to get to the top,” she admits, “but I do want to that with Ipswich. I'm just going to do everything that I can to do that. I think that this year especially was a big commitment for me to just give myself another chance at doing that with Ipswich, to really give everything to it.

“So, I think by the end of the season, whatever happens, I'll just be happy that I've given it another go.

“In an ideal world, I'd love to get to the top with Ipswich and I really believe that this club is striving for that and we could go to such exciting places here. I'm really forward to it.”

Still just 22, Peskett reflected on the difference going professional three years ago made to her life:“I guess financially it worked well with my university degree so it was definitely a big help there.

“More recently, I've been able to finish uni and quit my job which has been a massive help that I can now concentrate on football and that can be my soul focus.”

That commitment from the club was put to the test almost immediately when Peskett ruptured her anterior cruciate ligament ending her 2021/22 season. It was a long road back for the player as she watched her team reach the quarter-finals of the FA Cup - and a first-ever appearance on national television - without her.

“I think I became very obsessive,” she recalled. “I realised I've got maybe quite an obsessive personality where I was just so focused on getting back as strong as I could that I didn't really worry about anything else, that was all I really cared about.

“I think it was so hard for me at the time, but I think now looking back, it was the best thing that could have happened because I really had time to focus on myself - physically and mentally.

“I just put everything into that and now, I'm in a much better place for it and I think I'm a lot more grateful for being able to play. When I feel grateful and I feel like I'm able to smile, I think that really helps me as a player.”

Also helping her smile are her housemates, Town team-mates Maria Boswell and Kyra Robertson. “I'm still living with them,” she reveals. “They're great housemates and we're best mates and we can all have a laugh.

“Last year, they were still in full-time jobs, where as my university was a bit more flexible. I think they were quite jealous of me at the time, I could go in at 10am and they were up at six.

“They really look up to the fact that I committed to my university studies and they saw me doing work at whatever time - late nights - when they were done at work. I think they did respect that a lot and they were really helpful.”

After finishing her studies with a first in her BSc in Sport and Exercise Science, Peskett last month had her graduation ceremony in the town on the same day on which men's team manager Kieran McKenna was presented with an honorary degree from the University of Suffolk.

Peskett told me the pair were able to share a moment together. “We had a quick chat before and got a little photo. His outfit was a lot more stand-out than mine, I was a bit jealous actually. It was a really good achievement for both of us, it was a really nice day to share for the club.”

As one of the club's most recognisable players alongside Natasha Thomas, Ella Rutherford and Boswell, Peskett is often often thrust forward as one of the faces of the Ipswich Town Women's team but she is quick to appreciate the unsung heroines in a team which has only conceded five goals in the league this season.

“To be honest, the whole backline. I do feel like goalies don't get as much credit as they should and Nat (Negri) has been unbelievable this season,” the winger said.

“She has been a great signing for the club. So I think she's probably one that will do things that maybe certain fans won't notice or if you look through social media, you might not see her. She's great for the team, a great person as well, so I think I'd look out for Nat.”

Peskett and her teammates will be in Adobe Women's FA Cup second-round action on Sunday when they face Hashtag United at Parkside, Aveley (KO 3pm).

Elsewhere, Peskett's Town teammate Natasha Thomas has been left out of the Jamaica squad for their home internationals against South Africa on November 29th and December 2nd having won her first cap as a sub away against France in October.

Matchday Images

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midastouch added 11:05 - Nov 22 She's a top player. I'm sure she's a got a great career in front of her. Let's hope Sophie gets a deserved shot at a FA Cup QF in the not-too-distant future.
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