My goal is to find our winning women
THE VICTORIOUS Southport FC ladies team are aiming to reunite this month after 45 years.
The club are eager to trace its players and manager from the team’s triumphant early 1970s era for a reunion.
It’s a perfect time to re-unite with the growing interest in women’s sport and the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2019, which saw the England team reach the semifinals where they were narrowly defeated by eventual winners the USA.
Registered in 1969, The Southport Supporters’ Ladies Football Club won everything in the early 1970s and even beat the famous Doncaster Belles, who still play in the Women’s Premier League. They won the League Cup, the Mitre Cup and the Con Rogan Cup.
Carol Bennion, who used to played for the team from 1969 to 1977, said the game was a lot different these days.
She said: “It’s changed so much from our day. We got changed in barns and sheds those days and played in deep mud sometimes. Our boots were the leather Adidas Brazil boots which were heavy when wet – as were the balls we played with.
“The pitches now are better,
the players are fitter and the technique is better – playing full-time helps.
“I think we were probably in the wrong time period. We would all love to be playing now.
“Women’s football was really popular in WWI when all the men went to war. The first women’s team (they were a factory team in Preston) was the Dick Kerr ladies.
“They were so popular they even filled Goodison Park in 1920 with 53,000 people, with 14,000 left outside. Their star player was Lily Parr from St Helens who scored 43 goals in her first season.
“She is the only woman to be honoured so far at the National Football Museum where there is a plaque to her. We drew crowds of course, but not of that scale.”
She added: “In the early 1920s the English FA banned women’s football – they deemed it unsuitable for women, a true case of men telling women what they could do with their bodies – and prevented us playing on FA pitches.
“It wasn’t until after England men’s team won the World Cup in 1966 that pressure was put on the FA by Uefa to relax their stance. In 1969 the Women’s FA was founded.
“So for us starting to play in 1969, a half century of progress was lost and for me, the legacy of the hostility of the FA has been very damaging for women’s football.
“However it’s fantastic to see how girls have been so determined to play and the sport has developed beyond where we thought it could go.
“The Southport Ladies football team look back fondly on their playing days and probably would like to be remembered as pioneers in a very tough and then, controversial sport.”
The idea for the reunion was prompted by the recent unexpected deaths of four members of the squad of 22. The first was Carmen Brennan and in the past 12 months Elaine Wallworth, Mo Moran and Lorraine (Lozz) Redford have also died.
Carol said: “It brought home to