Christiansen retires to test herself at ultra-endurance
Izzy Christiansen is retiring from football aged 31 in order to concentrate on punditry work, her coaching badges and even tackle ultra-endurance events. The England midfielder, who earned 31 caps and won the Champions League with French side Lyon after spells at Manchester City and Birmingham City, will play her final match for Everton tomorrow.
“I’m beginning with, at the end
of June, running a section from Leeds to Manchester – to help raise money for MND [motor neurone disease]. [It] will be my first sort of endurance event. I won’t go too hard too soon,” she explained on Sky Sports’ “Three Players and a Podcast”.
“I feel like it’s the right decision [to retire]. It’s been on my mind since the start of this season, I thought it might be on the horizon. Since 2019, I’ve been working really hard on the media side things, analysing football and data to be able to try and deliver decent punditry or radio comms and I feel I’ve really grown in that. The way I look at it is a crossroads and I want to go forwards, not sideways.
“The best advice I was ever given was ‘never live the same year twice’, and I felt like staying in the game playing I’d just be repeating like I have [ just had].
“When any athlete finishes their career, you don’t often have the choice to do it within your own control, and I feel very fortunate to be in that situation where I can make this decision to step away from it.
“I’m just super excited and thankful for all the opportunities I’ve been given. Now’s the time for me to move on.”
Christiansen, who was part of the England squad who reached the semi-finals of Euro 2017 and helped the Lionesses win 2019’s Shebelieves Cup in the United States, added that she was working towards her Uefa B coaching badges and said: “I want to stay in sport and help grow the game in
whatever capacity that looks like. I’m hooked on coaching at the moment, I’ve found that fantastic. That is something that I do want to move into in the future – and obviously I’ve been doing a lot of work in the media. We’ll see what that brings in the future.”
A winner of four major trophies while at Manchester City, during which time she was named as the 2016 PFA Player of the Year, Christiansen knows finishing her career facing her former club back at the Academy Stadium tomorrow is special
timing. “My time at Man City was definitely the best of my career. It feels like a really fitting ending that I’m going to be finishing my career on some grass that we had so many fond memories on.”
Christiansen’s contribution to City’s title-winning season of 2016 came when she was arguably at her peak. She also scored the winner in the final when City lifted their first major women’s trophy, the 2014 League Cup, and was also part of the squad for Birmingham City’s only FA Cup triumph in 2012.