Leah Williamson

"I was brought up never to expect people to say no to me, because if I said I wanted to do something, then I was pushed forward and given as many resources as possible to do it by my family."

"When I was younger, I felt I had to be a rebel to pursue what I wanted to."

"If you want to become a woman footballer you don’t have to be a rebel these days. You can just follow your feet."

"Kids are never the problem; it’s nearly always the parents."

"The boys were embarrassed. There was pressure because they’d been taught that they shouldn’t be beaten by a girl."

"I’ve always been very opinionated. But I was dismissed as being angry."

"When you see somebody that looks like you, you think it’s achievable. If you can’t see it, you can’t be it. So that starts with us being women at the top, but obviously then it’s about being a diverse group of women."

"I was never interested in politics at school, but the more you see the injustice in the world, how can you not have an interest in what’s going on if you care about the community you live in?"

"I can only speak on this as a woman, because that’s my group, but every single woman who has got herself to the point of playing, especially professionally, has had to face misogyny."

"So once you come into our game, there’s no way we would alienate anybody. I don’t think you would say anything in a woman’s changing room that would shock anybody because it’s so open. It’s, be who you are, celebrate who you are, because this is a safe space for you."

"In the book, I speak about, find what you love, then do it, and do it till you’ve got nothing left to give it. If I’m telling people to follow their passions and to be the best versions of themselves, how could I give my life to something that wasn’t along those guidelines?"

"I’m still waiting to find that thing that really sparks something in me."

"I like it because when you think back to key moments, you always remember the music that was playing."

"I didn’t want to be them, and I didn’t want to do what they did. But they still inspired me to be me. And I think that’s the point: that little girl doesn’t have to want to be a footballer, she just has to grow up knowing that she can do what she wants."

"I don’t want to use the word oppression, because it’s really, really harsh. But we’ve been banned, we’ve been constantly told ‘you can’t do this, you can’t do that’. But the one thing that we can be is whoever we want – whether you are gay, or you aren’t."

"The split second that they say something can affect you forever. So you’re basically making a choice: do I want to live and just be happy in my bubble and be who I am, safely? Or do I want to stand up and be open about it, but then have to be strong enough to repel all of that negativity?"

"Nothing makes me feel the way football or music do. But you choose which song you want to put on… football is out of your control."

"We know how well sport has served us…the health benefits, the self-confidence…we want to make sure that’s accessible and provided as an opportunity to these younger people because it’s slowly, slowly being put backwards on the priority list."

"Being so heavily involved in sport was the best thing that ever could have happened to me going through school."

"When I look back now, when I look at the insecurities of girls that weren’t active, I never had those worries, I never had the worry of getting changed in the changing room and not liking my body, because I knew I was strong and powerful."

"Even if someone else might not have liked the way I looked, to me I was fit, I was healthy, and I looked a way that I was happy with because I knew what I was doing made me happy."

"'Love is love' - I say it all the time and people are starting to get a bit annoyed I think. It's very transferable to a lot of situations."

"But it's true, being a woman in this life is hard."