The World At Her Feet

With no women’s game at home, Rose Reilly helped Italy win the World Cup

- MARIE PENMAN

SEEING a Scottish footballer lift the World Cup - or indeed, any trophy - must be the dream of every member of the Tartan Army.

Yet the fact is, a Scot has already held this trophy aloft, though the chances are, you won't know their name.

That's because this legendary footballer is a woman. Oh, and she won the trophy playing for Italy - not Scotland.

Rose Reilly was born in 1955 and grew up in Stewarton in Ayrshire, one of eight children, and the only one who was football-daft.

"Football is my life," says Rose. "It's always going to be in me. When I was young, I was determined to play, no matter what.

"When I was five, I asked Santa for a football for Christmas and got a doll instead. I persuaded a wee boy in my street to swap his football for my doll!"

When Rose was 17, she read a story in her dad's Daily Record about women playing football in France. At the time, the Scottish Football Association had banned women from playing the game.

She persuaded her pal, fellow player Edna Neillis, to accompany her into Glasgow, where they went to the offices of the Daily Record and asked to speak to the journalist who wrote the story about the women's game.

Impressed by their determination and sensing a good story, the reporter, Stan Shivas, persuaded his editor to pay for flights to France for the girls, and set up a trial for them playing for French team, Stade de Reims.

"They couldn't get the ball off us," said Rose. "We ran riot, and by half-time, they'd asked to sign us."