Loving feeling for Jo if City land historic win
Far-travelled Glasgow star rates Paris match as biggest of career
JO LOVE is a woman for the big occasion – but even past exploits will be dwarfed by this weekend’s shot at glory.
Having played at both home and abroad at club level, including lining up for Celtic, Kilmarnock and Cocoa Expos i n Florida, the Glasgow City midfielder is one of the most experienced footballers ever to play the game in Scotland.
On the international stage, the Paisley native also has a penchant for prosperity.
Love has represented her country an incredible 150 times, banging in eight goals in the process.
Some of those strikes have come against some of the big guns in women’s football, including France and Canada, while she also featured for Scotland in the World Cup play-off defeat to the Netherlands last year.
However, all of the above would pale in comparison to a victory tomorrow when City go up against Paris St Germain in the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final clash.
They are without doubt one of the most formidable teams on the continent, with Glasgow head coach Eddie Wolecki-Black comparing the match-up to Barcelona against Albion Rovers in the men’s game.
It is a sentiment echoed by Love, who said: “I would probably say this is the biggest game of my career in terms of the hype that has been surrounding it. It’s been massive.
“Scotland in the play-offs came close, but I guess that has kind of petered out. But there is a lot of expectation riding on Glasgow City to do the country proud and we’re just going to try and do our best.”
ANOTHER landmark moment came for Love recently as she helped secure City’s place in the last eight.
In the previous round’s second leg against Zurich, the midfielder slammed home a shot on 81 minutes to level the tie 4-4 on aggregate with Glasgow trailing on goal difference, only for Suzanne Lappin to strike in the dying minutes.
“I just wanted to hit the target, that’s all that was going through my head at the time,” she said.
“It was all about giving us a bit of hope at the time and eventually it spurred the team on.
“For anyone to score at that time would have been important, it just so happened it was me.”
Love added: “We like to make it hard for ourselves. Hopefully we won’t give ourselves such an uphill struggle this time against PSG.
“We’ve started slowly in the other two ties. I don’t know why, maybe the occasion has got the better of some of us as we still have a lot of inexperienced players at this level.
“We know what we are capable of, but we are also aware of the serious dangers PSG pose.”
Tickets for tomorrow’s match are available at the turnstiles at Airdrie’s Excelsior Stadium, priced £10 for adults and £5 for kids. Kick-off is at 4.05pm.