Ross County Girls and Women FC continues to create new opportunities for girls to play football, with the club having grown to include 100 players aged four to 16.
The club was formed as Invergordon Girls in 2008, and has since moved under the County banner in a move to grow the women’s game in Ross-shire. It is run independently from the men’s club.
Now in their third season, County are striving towards creating better opportunities for their youngest and oldest players.
The club currently has a strong pool of players aged 11-16, but after hosting a McDonald’s funded training session back in September, there was a clear interest from children as young as four, with more than 100 girls between P1 to S6 in attendance.
Chairman Iain Maciver hopes to have established under-8 and under-10 teams by Easter, as well as hosting permanent training sessions for even younger children.
He said: “When we initially started this club as Invergordon Girls back in 2008, if we had 15 girls come to training and had enough for a team, we thought that was a decent turnout.
“Even a couple years ago when we became Ross County, it would’ve been unthinkable to get 100 girls to turn up for training.
“We normally would get about 60 at training nowadays, but when we opened it up to the younger groups, we had 100 girls there.
“It just shows that there’s a lot of room for growth here and that’s why we’re aiming at Easter to launch permanent teams our younger players and hopefully continue to have 100-plus girls at training every week.”
Aiming towards a full pathway
Ross County currently train in Tain during the winter and in Invergordon for the rest of the year, but the players hail from all over Ross-Shire and beyond, including girls who travel from as far as Skye and Wick.
The club provides the girls an opportunity to play, but the players have been showing they aren’t just on the pitch to make up the numbers – with the under-13’s and under 15’s finishing as runners-up in their respective leagues, as well as reaching the finals of the North Cup.
Our U13s played in a league decider play off today against Thistle Girls. We lost 5-1. Congratulations to Thistle.
This young team have come on in leaps and bounds this year and have really gelled. The improvements and friendships made have been absolutely amazing to watch⚽️🦌💙 pic.twitter.com/9rTNJfL62g— Ross County Girls & Women FC (@RossCountyGirls) December 11, 2021
The future is bright for Ross County’s players who might look to progress to women’s football, as Maciver plans to establish a senior women’s squad that would play in the SWF Highlands and Islands league within the next couple of years.
A full pathway would reflect the growth of the club, but also the commitment and dedication from the players, their parents and the community that has allowed such development to happen.
Maciver added: “The parents are absolutely loving the club. They’re really supportive of everything we do.
“Any initiative there is, everyone gets behind it and are really appreciative of all the work the coaches give up their time to do.”
“There’s an awful lot of admin work that goes on in the background that people don’t see with registering teams and players and just the organisation of the club.
“Without that help of our club secretary, Glenda Scobbie, we wouldn’t be able to function really.”
“We couldn’t do what we do without those people and the support of the sponsors and the community.”
Player Awards
Ross County’s awards night was due to take place on December 17, but due to the recent spike in coronavirus cases and change in guidance, the event was postponed for a second year in a row.
Instead, the club handed out the awards sponsored by Mairi Urquhart & Son at their weekly training session.
The winners included –
Most improved player: U15 – Alison Wood. U13 – Leona Afrin. U11 – Emerson Hutton.
Player’s player of the year: U15 – Sophie Skinner. U13 -Rhian Foreman. U11 – Alex Quigley.
Player of the year: U15 – Agnes Hooper and Lilly Mackenzie. U13 – Amy Marshall. U11- Violet Gunn.
Club Ethos award: U15 – Hope Warner-Macintosh. U13 – Ellie Hutton. U11 – Eilidh McWhirter.
Ross County are looking for new girls in the local area who have an interest in playing football to join the club. The club currently provides training for girls in P5-S6 and plans to expand to Primary 1 in the new year.
For more information, the club can be found on Facebook or contacted via email: rosscountygwfc@gmail.com
