Ex-England star Alex Scott: 'I went from playing football on my council estate to World Cups'

Alex Scott was born in 1984 in Poplar, London. She signed to Arsenal aged eight and broke into the first team in 2002, when she was just 18. Aside from short spells at Birmingham and Boston Breakers, she remained at Arsenal until retiring in 2017. She was part of the quadruple winning team in the 2006-07 season, when she scored the winning goal in the UEFA Women’s Cup, final, making them the first British side to win the competition. Scott played 140 times for England, representing her country in four European championships and three world cups.

Following her retirement, Scott moved into punditry full-time, working for the BBC and Sky Sport. In 2019 she came fifth in Strictly Come Dancing and two years later was named the main presenter of BBC One’s Football Focus.

Speaking to the Big Issue for her Letter to My Younger Self, Alex Scott looks back on her determination to make it, growing up in a controlling environment and meeting her heroes.

At 16 years old, I was fully focused on football. I was with Arsenal, playing for England in the youth set up, and living at the Arsenal Academy in Hertfordshire. My focus was on making the Arsenal women’s first team because they had so many amazing players. There was a lot of fear – if I didn’t make it into the team, what was my life going to be? I never wanted to be seen as a failure, so I clung on so no one could take being Alex Scott the footballer away from me.

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I struggled with school. I’m dyslexic and it’s not that I didn’t want to engage, I just found I couldn’t express myself. So it was easier to remove myself from an environment where I felt so awkward and misunderstood. If I was to do my school years over again, it’d be different because we’re now used to people learning in different ways.

I used to visit my nan in Wapping instead of going to school. She was from Jamaica and would teach me to cook or tell me about the history of Jamaica. We’d get the newspapers and discuss what was going on in the world. So I was educated in a very different way. I think it speaks to my life now – I’m interested in people and their stories. Asking about other people’s lives has always been my way of learning about the world. 

Music is a big thing in my life. When I was young, my dad was a DJ and always had vinyl around the house. Music was my escape. I could get lost in hearing a story full of emotion being sung. I would really relate. Aaliyah and Tupac were on my wall, I saw Mary J Blige and Lauryn Hill concerts. I connected with those powerful, soulful voices. Even though I was young, I could feel everything they’d gone through.

I grew up in a controlling environment because of my dad. I spoke a lot about my upbringing and what I went through with my dad in my book – I think mum allowing me and my brother to follow our passions was because she carried guilt about our early years. Back then, no one believed women’s football would become what it did. But my mum saw the freedom it was giving me. Football gave me something to cling on to. 

Football gave me a sense of this bigger community and bigger family. I was this other person at football. Escape is the word – I would leave Alex Scott from the council estate in the East End, and when I got to Highbury, I’d be Alex Scott the footballer. No one knew what was going on in my home life, no one
was asking questions. I was among friends playing football, which I was very good at. 

People gravitated towards me as a leader. I was captain from an early age. I wasn’t the loudest, I just had a way of helping the team come together. And people would listen to me. I never had a Plan B. This was my route. This was my way out. I was always trying to show people that I loved it and could be relied on… so just pick me please! 

When youth centres are taken away from inner city kids, we all lose. They’re the places I loved and had so much fun in. It was about being part of a community, forgetting everything in your home life that was so troubling. We could be free in a youth centre – it’s where you come into your own, get a personality and understand yourself.

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I didn’t have a footballing hero to look up to. There were no women professional footballers we could see. But I always gravitated towards Ian Wright. I could see he was like me. I didn’t know his background, but every time he played for Arsenal, you could see that joy. It was his absolute everything. He played with the biggest smile on his face. My younger self would never have thought in a million years we would be friends and end up working together. I met Ian when I was working in the Arsenal laundry. I don’t think I even spoke two words because I was so shy and awestruck. 

My younger self didn’t want other people’s limitations to stop her or say, ‘You’re a council estate kid so you’re gonna stay there all your life.’ She could see a big world out there and wanted to go after it. She knew there was more and was going to do anything to explore life. As I’m talking now, it makes me smile. Because where did that even come from? 

That young girl was always seeking love from others. I’d maybe tell her you don’t need to do that. Let down those barriers and let people in more. I think it was because I didn’t have that father figure, so I wanted my coaches to understand and love me. It would really hurt me when I thought they couldn’t see me. 

Young Alex would never believe me if I told her what was going to happen. Her mind would be blown. She would have a cheeky grin and be so excited: ‘This is really gonna happen? I can’t wait!’ But I don’t think she’d believe she would go from playing in a football cage on her council estate to playing World Cups and being a TV presenter. 

I’m so proud to be part of the generation of Lionesses that fought for central contracts and funding. It’s amazing that women’s football has come from a place where people laughed about it to where it is now. I love it. Because football is for everyone. And I’m never going to stop fighting for that. But there is still a long way to go to keep changing perceptions. 

Winning a quadruple with Arsenal, playing at Wembley, playing in a World Cup – these are things you dream about. We used to play Wembley Fives in the football cage. So to fast-forward and be on that main stage, starting for England, was everything. Those are the special moments as a footballer. 

I never stopped learning, even though I struggled at school. So getting a degree [in professional sports writing and broadcasting] was a proud moment. It was also a way to shut people up because no one can say I don’t deserve it or I’m just ticking a box. I did it the right way. I don’t know whether it’s about coming from the women’s game, but I did feel I needed to shut people up. And I did so many work placements to get where I am, it was like I fast-forwarded and imagined people saying I didn’t deserve to be on television. 

I don’t see myself as a pioneer. The moment I would see myself in such a way is when it all changes. There’s still so much more to fight for to help that next generation – and I feel like I am in a position to use my platform so that, in the future where hopefully I have kids, they won’t have to fight like I’ve had to in my life. Then they can just go out and live life full of joy.

I’d tell my younger self to be more open and accepting to love. I always felt I was troubled and complex and wouldn’t let anyone in. I was fearful of hurting them. Everyone sees me now and comments on how happy I am – in love and life. And it’s because I’ve done the work on myself to allow someone in.

My first relationship [with former footballer Kelly Smith] was such a big part of my life. There were so many amazing experiences we had together – going to live in America, our time at Arsenal, and I always remember those parts. It’s helped me develop into the person I am now, which is happy within myself, and allowed me to be free. So that’s how I look at past relationships. There’s tough times, but you have to remember why you entered the relationship in the first place. And I’m in a very good place now – I’m in love and I’m happy. 

Young Alex would be so surprised by some of the places she’s managed to go to through the sport she loves. I love travel. I’m so inquisitive about the world. I’ve been to Iraq where I opened a football field and played with a girls’ team. I’ve been to Namibia with Soccer Aid and some of the kids I met just took me back to where I started. Football is absolutely everything. Kicking a football around the street can give a kid hope for the future and change the way that they see life. I’m so grateful I’ve managed to travel the world and connect with people through the sport that I love.

At the Qatar World Cup, I wore the One Love armband because this is who I am. This is the community I support. I wasn’t really political. Was I standing there preaching or making a speech? No, I wore an armband. It goes back to my belief that football should be for everyone. And everyone should feel safe and included. I also spoke about Gianni Infantino because he had done a big speech the day before saying about how he knows how it is to be discriminated against – but you can’t compare yourself to people coming to Qatar and feeling scared for their life because they might end up in prison or can’t be free to be who they are. I’m not going to speak on every subject, but I will be passionate about things that resonate with me.

If I told my younger self that I’ve written a book, she’d come back and say, well, now I know you’re lying – that is not my future. It is one of the things I am most proud of when I look at my accomplishments. I actually wrote my own book. No ghostwriter involved. I sat on my laptop going back and forth to Manchester to do BBC Sport. Some chapters I’d be sitting there crying, but then I would shut my laptop and feel free. Getting it all out there in the world was so freeing. I did not believe the impact it would have on people who had been through similar experiences. No way I would have ever believed you if you told that 16-year-old Alex that was going to happen in the future.

Revisiting all this has made me smile a lot. It’s made me think that for Young Alex, it was tough and it’s gonna be tough. But when I look back at her, she is making Big Alex smile and be very proud of the young one. 

Soccer Aid for UNICEF is on ITV on 15 June.  

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