It says a lot about the competitive intensity all her junior soccer coaches remember that Georgia Stanway catching an 11 pound carp on her second attempt at fishing.
She had been spending some time watching her boyfriend, Toulouse pro rugby player Olly Ashall-Bott, take off when the idea of trying her hand arose during the first pandemic lockdown.
Ashall-Bott figured they would be playing around on a river bank during one of their night fishing trips, where they were camping near the house they had bought in Widnes, Cheshire. Stanway had other ideas.
Stanway to heaven: Georgia’s impressive goal in extra time saw England overtake Spain and reach the semi-finals of the UEFA European Championship
Stanway celebrates with England manager Sarina Wiegman after England beat Spain
She came across someone selling his fishing gear – top quality, at a very good price – and couldn’t resist. Then she landed the carp, which made Ashall-Bott’s performance look downright modest. “Literally the second time I go out there and Georgia catches the biggest fish ever!” he relates. ‘That is her! She’s so competitive in everything she does.’
It didn’t stop there. The two met up with the England women’s carp fishing team, with Stanway appearing keen to learn more techniques. She and Ashall-Bott collectively caught 12 fish on that occasion while the national team caught 100.
Ashall-Bott, whose injury-plagued career finally got off the ground with his move to France, reveals that leisurely sport is a foreign word when you’re partnered with Stanway. She has often had the best results playing teqball, a combination of soccer and table tennis on a curved table in the back garden. Golf is the only sport she hasn’t mastered yet.
Stanway decided a tense and difficult match in Brighton with her 96th minute pile driver
Ashall-Bott described his girlfriend as a “hero” after her winning goal on Wednesday night.
The football coaches, who have known Stanway since they were teenagers, credit much of their success – including the extra-time goal against Spain that propelled England into the Euro semi-finals against Sweden in Sheffield on Tuesday night – to the same vivacity.
The little 23-year-old and her England team-mates Keira Walsh and Ella Toone are all products of Blackburn Rovers Academy. All three expired in the club’s senior team as teenagers, although Stanway would be most likely to give something back if the opposition tried to intimidate them.
“When other players tried to kick them, they could never get a reaction,” says Gemma Donnelly, the Blackburn Ladies manager who has worked with all three. “But Georgia maybe a little less. She has this tenacity. She has a bite to her.’
Stanway and her boyfriend, rugby league player Olly Ashall-Bott, and their catch of the day
Stanway took up fishing during the Covid lockdowns and is now using the pastime to relax
Her stature, 5 feet 4 inches, helps. “She’s expanded with all the strength and conditioning training,” says Donnelly. “But she was one of our smaller ones and what she lacked in size she made up for in making good use of her body.”
Another former Stanway Blackburn coach, Amanda Goodwin, now a regional FA talent coach, describes Stanway’s hand as severely swollen after being stepped on during a U13 game. She hesitated to break away.
Donnelly recalls that Stanway’s youth side needed a win at Everton at Blackburn at Liverpool University’s Wyncote Sports Ground to beat Manchester United for the title.
“She took it upon herself to drive through their defenses, through the canals, through the middle,” she recalls. ‘She directed this game. I’ve lost count of her shots. I don’t know why the ball didn’t go in.”
Stanway and Ashall-Bott have been dating since 2018 after he sent her an Instagram DM
Blackburn youth coaches all remember the four-hour round trip Monday and Wednesday night training sessions in Blackburn entailed for Stanway, who had traveled from Barrow in Cumbria to ask for an exemption from school.
Blackburn wasn’t the richest club. Stanway became accustomed to home games on leased land high atop Blacksnape playing fields, in line with the landmark Darwen Tower, 85 feet above sea level. ‘It snowed in the summer!’ tells Connelly. “Georgia and the others were out there setting up the nets, taking them down, putting in the corner flags. We didn’t have the most amazing resources. So there is no entitlement.’
Stanway was 16 when she joined Manchester City in July 2015. She and Ashall-Bott were known through mutual friends when she responded to his Instagram request to meet four years ago.
Ashall-Bott introduced himself when he was a Huddersfield Giants player – he has since moved to Toulouse
Stanway is Manchester City’s all-time all-time goalscorer and has won a number of major accolades
With Toulouse currently in the middle of a desperate Super League relegation battle, he hasn’t been to their Euro games, although they FaceTime from their respective dressing rooms every time they play.
Ashall-Bott, who was on the sofa with the couple’s dog, Milo, when Stanway scored against Spain, didn’t see the scoring opportunity she had imagined. “I yelled at the TV for Georgia to pass – and ‘Pass the ball!’ screamed! — but then she just hit it,” he says. “Then my phone went crazy. And I went insane. The dog ran away because he thought I was going to yell at him!’
The 24-year-old will seek permission from Toulouse manager Sylvain Houles to attend Wembley should the England side reach Sunday’s final. His own team plays in Hull on Friday. “What a year that would be for us if they win the Euros and we stay in the Super League,” he says.
They have rented out the house they bought in Widnes and Stanway is playing for Bayern Munich next season.
Ashall-Bott has already researched flights from Toulouse. But before all that, there’s the small matter of England taking part in the Women’s World Carping Championships at the end of next month on home soil in Oxfordshire.
An inclination to this national team? Her boyfriend wouldn’t trust her.
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