Proud Hammers women’s team boss Jack Sullivan will arrive at Wembley this afternoon for the Womens’ Cup Final admitting there’s lots to be done at that level.
No doubt there would have been a few more thousand at the stadium for the clash with Manchester City had the Premier League, FA or Southampton agreed to a change of time or even date in the case of the FA.
However, there is still likely to be between 40k or 50k watching a game where the fans can mingle unsegregated in a carnival atmosphere.
It has to be hoped the mens’ team can start off a Saturday double with a win over Saints on their last home appearance of the season before the ladies create a shock over City an hour or two later.
It’s a big achievement by the women and the game can be watched on BBC if you get home in time or can find a friendly pub.
In the meantime ClaretandHugh sends its best wishes to the team as they look to create a piece of history for the club in a game that really does matter despite the knockers.
And speaking to reporters as quoted by Football: London Britain’s youngest boss declared that right now he had no thoughts of taking over from his Dad as club owner saying : I think to be honest at the moment I’m investing all my time into the women’s.
“There’s still a lot to be done with the women’s. We still want to make it as sustainable as possible and we still want to get as many people here as possible and I’m just taking it day by day and not looking too far into the future.
“You never know what the future could hold. Anything could happen. We just take it as we can.”
Sullivan Jnr tentatively began his involvement in the women’s team after leaving school at 16. and getting work experience at the club explaining: “I literally did everything.
“I did about a years worth of work experience. I was in the academy for about two weeks, looking at scouting and coaching there, I was at HR for about a month, corporate sales I did for about a month and a half, sponsorship I did for a week, ticket office, warehouse, club shop, media
“I worked within the football club for the first year, I’ve been at the football club for about seven years. I was very fortunate in that I knew lots of the people, there’s lots and lots of heads of departments that have been their for five years, six years, seven years, some longer, some 30 years, and we’re really lucky to have people like that at the football club so I think they’ve seen me grow up.
“I’ve gone into a high pressure environment but I thought and dad thought at the time that it would be a great place for me to learn about how football clubs run and how a football club works on a smaller scale.”
Win or lose tonight he quotes a certain H Redknapp’s famous line: “Win or lose, we’re on the booze.”
“One thing we want to try and do it build a women’s supports base alongside the men’s, where we don’t have to lean on the men’s as much. I think we have started to do that
“Chelsea for example, they are amazing at that. Even when their men’s play they are still getting 2,500 at Kingsmeadow for their women’s games. We want the supporters to be proud of the whole football club, whether that is men’s or women’s or whatever.
On reaching the final he says: “”We’ve had the luck of the draw getting here [the final], but obviously now we’re here we think anything’s possible.
The women’s side entered three competitions, we know it’s unlikely, but anything is possible and to get to this final is incredible and something that is going to be a massive celebration for us to get here in our first season.”
Have you really put knockers into a piece on womens football? Very 1970’s!!
As Kevin Keegan once declared ‘England is a nation of knockers’
So all I can say to you Hugh is Ooohhh errr missus!
LOL 🙂