Founding members of the English Football League, Aston Villa, are bringing their Girls
Academy squad to Canada.
The club
Aston Villa were established in 1874, when a conversation between four men in the streets
of Birmingham, England, paved the way for a club that would become one of the biggest
names in the global game.
The FA Cup is the oldest competition in world football and was taken very seriously in the
late 1800s by Aston Villa, who opted to pursue football over rugby as they thought it was
better suited to complementing the summer cricket season. They won the FA Cup for the
first time in 1887 by beating local rivals West Bromwich Albion in the final.
A year later, club director William McGregor started the English Football League with 11
other founding clubs from across the country. The men’s team have since won several
domestic league and cup trophies, and European titles, in their 150-year history.
Now under current boss Unai Emery, Villa’s Premier League squad will embark on their first
campaign in the UEFA Champions League, marking another milestone for this grand-old
club.
Women’s U21s
Aston Villa’s women’s team currently play in the Women’s Super League (WSL) – the top-
flight of women’s soccer in England. The team has been affiliated with Ason Villa since 1989,
having initially formed as Solihull FC in 1973.
The academy setup at Aston Villa covers three stages: Foundation Phase, Youth
Development Phase, and the Girls Academy, each playing their part in providing
opportunities through several age groups from U9 through to U21. The U21 team that is
coming to Kamloops this summer is from the last stage, the Girls Academy, which prepares
players to move into the professional game.
The U21s play their matches in the FA Professional Game Academy League, taking to the
field against some of the best academies in England.
Developing a pathway
Several players from past academy squads have broken into the Aston Villa Women’s first
team, and the player development is showing no signs of slowing down.
Georgia Mullett starred for Aston Villa’s academy team before signing a professional
contract in September last year. She went on to feature eight times for her club in the WSL,
and rub shoulders with the likes of Canada Women’s National Team players Adriana Leon
and Sabrina D'Angelo who also play for the Villa.
Mullet took a similar route to Ebony Salmon, who graduated from the Villa academy in 2017
and has since played stateside with Racing Louisville and Houston Dash before returning to
Villa in 2023.
Make sure to head to Hillside Stadium over the next week to see some potential future stars
in global women’s soccer.
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