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Women's Soccer Coaching

39 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★★ - 2 ratings

The official podcast of Women's Soccer Coaching providing insight and advice from youth and pro soccer coaches focusing on the women's game.

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Episodes

Juan Carlos Amoros - Live the journey

February 14, 2024 10:00 - 24 minutes - 17 MB

Gotham City head coach Juan Carlos Amoros, 2023’s NWSL coach of the year, opens up to CARRIE DUNN about adapting to different cultures, delegating wisely, an emotional Spurs reunion and not being a ‘superhero’.

Sally Needham - The brain game

January 10, 2024 09:00 - 32 minutes - 22.6 MB

When it comes to understanding player behaviour, human development specialist Sally Needham says neuroscience holds the key. She explains to Carrie Dunn how to harness it and transform coaching relationships.

Paige Palazzolo - Turning the Paige. Plus: 2023 Reflections

December 13, 2023 22:00 - 51 minutes - 35.2 MB

A goalkeeper grounded in futsal, Paige Palazzolo is now head coach of the US Women’s Amputee National Team. She tells Carrie Dunn how she came to be in the role and the challenges and triumphs it can bring.  Plus Women's Soccer Coaching Editor Hannah Duncan, and Editor-in-chief, Steph Fairbairn, discuss three years of WSC! Read the article: Women's Soccer Coaching - Coaching Advice - Paige Palazzolo: Coaching amputee players (womenssoccercoaching.com) Get more from Women's Soccer Coaching...

Chelsea Noonan - Chelsea's Challenge

November 08, 2023 09:00 - 35 minutes - 24.3 MB

Earlier this year, Chelsea Noonan took a leap of faith - leaving behind what she describes as her “dream job” to move halfway across the world for a new challenge. Previously, Noonan worked for the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) as a development officer and as assistant coach for the U17s women’s national team.  Now, she is in Melbourne, working with Women’s A-League team Western United in a dual assistant-coach and analysis role.  So what was it that made her move to Australia? R...

Carolina Morace - The London Pride

October 11, 2023 10:00 - 26 minutes - 18.5 MB

Carolina Morace is the new leader of the pack at London City Lionesses. But what lured the Italy icon to England’s second tier? She discusses the reasons and how she gets her playing style across with Steph Fairbairn. Read the article: Women's Soccer Coaching - Coaching Advice - Carolina Morace: Leading London City Lionesses (womenssoccercoaching.com) Get more from Women's Soccer Coaching: Women's Soccer Coaching - Home (womenssoccercoaching.com)

Leah Stringer - Stringer’s start-up

September 13, 2023 08:00 - 26 minutes - 18.2 MB

In a year’s time, history will be made for Lincoln University of Missouri when its women’s soccer team begins its first-ever season. The team will compete in the Great Lakes Valley Conference, an NCAA Division II level league. It will be led by Leah Stringer, a former interim head coach at Missouri Western and assistant coach at Northeast Texas Community College. On the honour of being Lincoln University’s first women’s soccer coach, Stringer told WSC: “When the announcement came out, my f...

Casey Brown - More than results

August 09, 2023 08:00 - 25 minutes - 17.2 MB

“Success, for me, is a process,” says Boston University women’s soccer head coach Casey Brown. “It is the process of trying to become great,” she adds. “It is the process of trying to become better every day. It’s the journey. “That’s how we view it in our program. That’s how I try to view it in the way I lead and coach. “It is not a destination but a journey and a process that we get to go on every day with our amazing student athletes.”

The Women's World Cup coach diaries | Ep 4 | Ending on a high

August 04, 2023 14:00 - 18 minutes - 12.7 MB

In the final episode of our special series, Steph Fairbairn and Matt Ross, Republic of Korea Assistant coach, catch up after Korea held Germany to a 1-1 draw. Matt reflects on a brilliant performance and result, ponders why it took so long for Korea to show what they can do, explains what life will look like for him over the next few weeks, and offers coaches of all levels some solid advice...

The Women's World Cup coach diaries | Ep 3 | One more group game to go

July 31, 2023 12:00 - 17 minutes - 12.2 MB

In episode three of our special series, Steph Fairbairn and Matt Ross, Republic of Korea Assistant coach, chat once more. It's the day after Korea's 1-0 loss to Morocco, which leaves them at the bottom of their World Cup group. Matt reflects honestly on his team's performance throughout the tournament so far,  shares more about his support system, and looks ahead to Korea's final group fixture against Germany...

The Women's World Cup coach diaries | Ep 2 | All eyes on game two

July 26, 2023 17:00 - 13 minutes - 9.29 MB

In the second episode of our special series, Steph Fairbairn and Matt Ross, Republic of Korea Assistant coach, chat again. This time, it's the day after Korea's 2-0 defeat to Colombia.  Matt shares his thoughts on the game, how the team's attention has quickly turned to the next fixture against Morocco, and what his schedule is like as a coach at the World Cup...

The Women's World Cup coach diaries | Ep 1 | The night before kick off

July 24, 2023 13:00 - 9 minutes - 6.77 MB

In the first episode in a special series, Steph Fairbairn sits down with Matt Ross, Republic of Korea Assistant coach, to get an insight into what goes into being a soccer coach on the biggest stage of them all. It's the night before Korea's first match - a Group H fixture against Colombia. Matt shares how the team have prepared, how they want to play, and, importantly, if he thinks he'll get any sleep ahead of the big event...

Molly Bartrip - Molly's journey

July 12, 2023 11:00 - 30 minutes - 21.1 MB

In July 2021, Molly Bartrip rejoined Tottenham Hotspur, the club where she had started her career as a nine-year-old. Bartrip was 25 at the time of her homecoming, which she called a “full circle” moment. She had been away from the club for 16 years, most recently at Arsenal and Reading, and hit 100 WSL appearances in April this year.  However, “full circle” also referred to the journey she’d been on as a person in that time. In February 2022, half a season into her second stint with her ...

Lars Søndergaard - The wait is over

June 14, 2023 14:00 - 32 minutes - 22.5 MB

For the first time since 2007, Denmark are going to the Women’s World Cup. An outstanding qualifying campaign – winning all eight games, scoring 40 goals and conceding only two - was built on the lessons from last year’s Euros. On that occasion, Denmark didn’t get out of a group which also contained Germany, Spain and Finland. Heading into this tournament, though, they are equipped with more experience and, many would say, an easier group. Alongside European champions England, Denmark’s o...

Nicole Lukic - Nicole's stars align

May 10, 2023 15:00 - 24 minutes - 17 MB

In the first season of the USL W League - a pre-professional women’s soccer league in the USA - Minnesota Aurora lived up to its name and shone. Nicole Lukic’s team topped the Heartland Division, winning 11 of 12 games and drawing the other, scoring 35 goals and boasting the second highest goal difference across all the league’s seven divisions. Sadly, they saved their first loss for the championship game, when Tormenta FC beat them 2-1 after extra time. So near, and yet it will have felt ...

Meg Nemzer - Maryland mission

April 12, 2023 11:00 - 39 minutes - 27.5 MB

In December 2021, Meg Ryan Nemzer took on her dream job – head women’s soccer coach at the University of Maryland. For the Maryland native, getting offered the role was a ‘full circle’ moment.  Nemzer attended Rutgers University in New Jersey, where she was co-captain for three consecutive seasons and a key pillar of what many called the best defense in the country. In 2006, the team conceded just six goals and achieved 16 clean sheets – the most in Rutgers’ history. Nemzer went on to coa...

Sarah Lowdon - Cutting a dash

March 08, 2023 12:00 - 29 minutes - 20.3 MB

For Sarah Lowdon, the past year has been somewhat of a whirlwind. She went from being unemployed - a volunteer coach at college level - to acting head coach on the US’s biggest stage. Having left Penn State University in 2021 and joined NWSL team Houston Dash in March 2022 as an assistant coach, Lowdon was elevated to acting head coach just weeks later. She kept that role for half a season. “It was a crazy year,” Lowdon reflects to WSC, on a period when she went from no job to having thre...

Lisa Cole - Keeping the faith

February 08, 2023 16:00 - 43 minutes - 30.2 MB

In 1992, the backpass rule was brought in by soccer lawmakers IFAB - and inadvertantly changed one player’s career. Introduced to discourage time-wasting, the rule dictates that a goalkeeper cannot handle the ball following an intentional pass from a teammate, made using the foot.  It had a significant effect on the role of the goalkeeper and how they are coached, both technically and tactically. More specifically, it made a direct impact on Lisa Cole. Now director of goalkeeping at Unite...

Anja Heiner-Møller - Anja’s ambition

January 11, 2023 18:00 - 25 minutes - 17.7 MB

Anja’s journey - from being a lone girl in boys’ teams to among the most qualified and well-respected female coaches in Denmark - has been one in which she has “said yes to every opportunity”, As a player, she worked her way through the youth national teams, before gaining seven caps for the senior team. A midfielder, she was part of the Danish squad at the 2001 European Championships, where they were knocked out by Sweden in the semi-finals. She also played in the Uefa Women’s Cup - now t...

Mirelle van Rijbroek - Eyes on the prize

December 14, 2022 18:00 - 38 minutes - 26.6 MB

Mirelle van Rijbroek is the person currently in charge of unearthing the next rough diamonds to be shaped into sparkling gems. Since 2017, van Rijbroek has been the US Soccer Federation’s (USSF) Director of Talent Identification for the girls’ pathway, a job she says is more a “way of life”. Born in the Netherlands, van Rijbroek moved to Australia at the age of 22 to pursue her dream of playing soccer at the highest level. While playing, and working, she completed her Uefa C, B and A licen...

Natalie Lawrence - Wellington roots

November 09, 2022 16:00 - 35 minutes - 24.5 MB

On November 20, under the lights at Sky Stadium, and in front of up to 34,500 fans, Wellington Phoenix will make history. When the team kicks off their 2022-23 A-League Women campaign, it will be the first time a professional women’s soccer team from New Zealand have played on the country’s soil. Phoenix joined the league last season as an expansion team, but - like their male counterparts - played their home games in Australia, to avoid the travel complications associated with Covid restr...

Freya Coombe - Expansion pack

October 12, 2022 09:00 - 21 minutes - 14.8 MB

In their first year as an NWSL expansion team, and despite finishing eighth in the standings, Angel City FC had one of the best defensive records in the division, bettered only by the top three. It is something the new Los Angeles team prides themselves on, says head coach Freya Coombe. And it is no coincidence that they have achieved it with Coombe in charge. Indeed, in the 2021 season, when she was at the helm of NJ/NY Gotham FC (formerly Sky Blue FC), they boasted the second-best defens...

Rachel Lever - Living with ‘Endo’

September 14, 2022 16:00 - 29 minutes - 20 MB

Rachel Lever is women’s youth academy manager at Manchester City, overseeing the under-16s and under-21s. She also lives, and coaches, with endometriosis. It is a debilitating condition, where tissue similar to the lining of the womb starts to grow in other places, such as the ovaries and fallopian tubes. Some of the key symptoms include severe pain that stops or restricts normal activity, feeling sick, heavy periods and, sometimes, fertility problems.  In the UK, it takes, on average, ei...

Carla Ward - The Magic Ward

August 10, 2022 16:00 - 19 minutes - 13.7 MB

In November 2017, Carla Ward joined Sheffield United - then in the fourth tier of the English women’s pyramid - as player assistant manager. She had just left United’s cross-city neighbours Sheffield FC, who were in the second-tier WSL 2. It was the classic case of an experienced head dropping down a couple of divisions to offer the benefit of their experience, both on and off the pitch.  But just three months later came Ward’s Sliding Doors moment. United manager Dan O’Hearne stepped dow...

Amy Rodriguez and Lou Roberts - A-Rod's New Era and Stoking the Fire

July 13, 2022 16:00 - 41 minutes - 28.5 MB

Part 1 - Amy Rodriguez - A-Rod's New Era All-time US great AMY RODRIGUEZ is taking her first steps into coaching after accepting an offer to return to the college where her storied playing career began. She reveals to STEPH FAIRBAIRN how it all came about... Part 2 - Lou Roberts - Stoking the Fire She lived a dream by captaining her hometown club. Now LOU ROBERTS is on the coaching staff and tells STEPH FAIRBAIRN about her journey...

Lowri Roberts & Kat Lovett - The Welsh Way

June 08, 2022 16:00 - 44 minutes - 30.7 MB

Elite girls’ soccer in Wales has just come to the end of a transformative season – the first in which the Football Association of Wales (FAW) Trust Girls’ Academy u14s and u16s squads competed against boys. When this plan was announced in April 2021, Lowri Roberts - head of women’s and girls’ football at the FAW, and the spearhead behind this new approach - said: “Our aim is simple; to provide more best-v-best opportunities in training and games for our most talented girls.” She was just a...

Tracey Kevins - Shaping Futures

May 12, 2022 08:00 - 36 minutes - 25.3 MB

Reflecting on how the female game has changed over the course of her coaching career is no mean feat for Tracey Kevins.  During her near 20-year career in soccer, it has, she says, developed immeasurably into something that would have seemed “too far a reach for the female game” when she started out. Kevins was at the FA between 2005 and 2012, operating as a coach across the U15s, U17s, U19s and U23s age groups.  She began working in the US in 2013, first as head coach with LA Strikers FC...

Stephanie Savino - American Dream

April 13, 2022 19:00 - 22 minutes - 15.6 MB

Stephanie Savino is counting down the days until May 17, when the first ball is kicked in the new USL W League. A revived and slightly tweaked version of the 1995-2015 iteration of the W-League, the competition is described on its website as “the nation’s pre-professional league, developing the next generation of women’s talent both on and off the field, enhancing the women’s soccer pipeline between college and professional soccer”. It seems a perfect fit for Savino, who has spent her life...

Keri Sanchez - Hire and Higher

March 10, 2022 18:00 - 26 minutes - 18.1 MB

Keri Sanchez comes with a glowing resume – a standout playing career intertwined with, then followed by, a number of high profile, successful coaching roles. Sanchez’s first step into coaching came in 1996 with a call from the former goalkeeper coach of her college team, the North Carolina Tar Heels: Bill Steffen. Steffen was going to restart the University of Oregon’s women’s soccer program, as head coach, and he invited Sanchez to be his assistant. Having just graduated from the Univers...

Michele Nagamine - Fight and Flight

February 17, 2022 13:00 - 36 minutes - 25.1 MB

Each coaching role offers its challenges. Some, however, are more challenging than others. Coach Michele Nagamine currently holds one of those more challenging roles. Since December 2010, she has been head coach of the women’s soccer program at the University of Hawaii. They are one of 11 teams in the Big West Conference – the other 10 are all based in California, six hours’ flight away. That means the season is littered with the complexity of air travel, hotels and tailored preparation, o...

Kat Khosrowyar - Tehran turnaround

February 16, 2022 13:00 - 44 minutes - 30.7 MB

Katayoun “Kat” Khosrowyar is studying for a Masters degree in global affairs at Rice University in Houston, Texas. The purpose, she tells Women’s Soccer Coaching, is to “put all my skills, abilities and experience under one umbrella”. It would need to be a sizeable umbrella. Growing up in Oklahoma, with Iranian heritage, Kat became an avid soccer player, describing the first time she touched the ball as “love at first sight”. On a family holiday to Iran in 2005, Kat was spotted playing fu...

Lisa Fallon - First Among Equals

February 14, 2022 13:00 - 33 minutes - 23.2 MB

Growing up in Dublin in the 1980s, Lisa Fallon had one female soccer role model – Gabriella Benson. A woman working in a male-dominated environment, Benson oversaw a professional men’s team – unprecedented at that time. There was one problem. Benson was fictional – the lead character in UK television series The Manageress. It still had an impact on the teenage Fallon, watching back home in Ireland. “It was the first time I ever saw a woman in football,” Fallon told Women’s Soccer Coachin...

Jonatan Giraldez - How to improve Europe’s best?

February 14, 2022 13:00 - 27 minutes - 19.1 MB

2021 saw FC Barcelona Feminí become the first Spanish club to complete a continental treble – winning the Primera Division, Copa de la Reina and, for the first time, the Uefa Champions League. Women's Soccer Coaching sat down for an exclusive interview with manager, Jonatan Giraldez.

Heather Dyche - UNM

October 21, 2021 08:00 - 25 minutes - 17.7 MB

 Heather Dyche says the question she gets asked most is: ‘What advice would you give coaches looking to carve their own career path in soccer?’.  You need only look at Dyche’s packed Twitter bio to work out why. She is head coach of the University of New Mexico’s (UNM) women’s team, on the technical staff of New Mexico United, a FIFA technical expert, the only female coach on Concacaf’s education board, and founder and head coach of the LEAD Soccer Academy. And In January this year, she was...

Yolanda Thomas - Tulsa SC

September 09, 2021 13:00 - 34 minutes - 23.5 MB

 Yolanda Thomas - head coach of Tulsa Soccer Club and director of coaching for its girls program - has spotted a trend that needs addressing.  “We all know we need more women coaching,” she notes. “But if we’re going to have more women coaching, inevitably we’re going to end up with more mothers. “If we want these women to keep coaching, how can we support them?” Part of the solution is the Moms Who Coach initiative, a United Soccer Coaches (USC) group set up earlier this year that Thomas c...

Denise Schilte-Brown - University of South Florida

August 26, 2021 15:00 - 31 minutes - 21.5 MB

 As a player, Denise Schilte-Brown set college scoring records on her way to playing professionally in Germany and representing her native Canada. And in almost 25 years as a coach, she has mentored some top strikers, including current Canada breakthrough star Evelyne Viens. It is fair to say Schilte-Brown knows where the net is - and knows how to bring that out in others 

Carmelina Moscato - FC Nordsjælland

July 14, 2021 15:00 - 30 minutes - 20.7 MB

 Ex-Canada star CARMELINA MOSCATO is back in coaching again after a nomadic post-retirement life. STEPH FAIRBAIRN caught up with her to discuss her philosophy and how coaches can seize control of their career 

Amy Griffin - US Deaf Soccer WNT

June 14, 2021 10:00 - 30 minutes - 20.9 MB

As a World-Cup winning goalkeeper, successful youth coach and head coach of the US Deaf Women’s Team, AMY GRIFFIN knows how to get her message across. She explains her methods to STEPH FAIRBAIRN

Gemma Donnelly - Blackburn Rovers Manager

May 12, 2021 08:00 - 34 minutes - 23.8 MB

Gemma Donnelly has been on one hell of a journey. And she knows precisely when it first turned in her favour. It wasn’t in 2019, when the Blackburn Rovers team she leads were finally granted promotion to the FA Women’s Championship – the second tier of English football – after three successive seasons dominating the division below. It wasn’t even in 2014, when her side narrowly avoided relegation to tier four on the final day of the season, and she vowed to staff “we are never going throug...

Charlotte Healy - Manchester United Academy Manager

April 16, 2021 08:00 - 25 minutes - 17.9 MB

On February 2nd, 2020, Rebecca May’s brief substitute appearance in a Women’s Super League game at Reading made Manchester United history. The 18-year-old’s five-minute cameo saw her become the first player to graduate through United’s entire youth system, from under-10s, to the fledgling first team. It was a proud moment for all who knew the teenager - not least Charlotte Healy, the coach in charge of the club’s academy. Created ‘upside down’, Manchester United had a girls section before...