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Jill Scott played for England 161 times, making her the second most-capped England footballer ever. Before her retirement last year, she competed in 10 major tournaments across 16 years, and was part of the victorious Lionesses team at the 2022 European Championships. She began her career at Sunderland, where she grew up, and later played for Everton and Manchester City, where she won every domestic trophy. Last year she also won the TV reality show I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!

Here’s what we learned from her Desert Island Discs...

1. Her first disc was a brilliant motivator when she first played for England

Jill’s international career started with three goals in three appearances for the Under-19s.

“When we used to go on the coach and the bus journeys, we'd be playing this song full blast,” says Jill. “I remember Mo Marley, our manager, saying some people might not want to listen to music on the way to games, so I had to quickly purchase some headphones!”

“I used to just play this song over and over again: I’d think of the words of it, ‘The higher you build your barriers, the taller I become’ and I'd be thinking of the things that I was going to face in a football match. There's a line in there where it's like ‘If someone runs fast, I'll run faster than you’ and I would really motivate myself with this song.”

The song is Labi Siffre’s 1987 hit (Something Inside) So Strong. Siffre wrote it after watching a documentary about apartheid in South Africa and it was the subject of an episode of the Radio 4 series Soul Music.

2. Sport runs deep in her family – on both sides

“My dad played football,” says Jill, but then she also adds, “My mum did a lot of running cross country when she was younger!”

“I think when you go on to achieve something, the two families compete against each other and go, “Well, you know what, your grandma on this side used to play netball and then your grandma on this side used to run and it's a bit of a tug of war over whose genetics you got!” says Jill laughing.

"From a very early age, I just couldn't sit still... I'd just want to be outside no matter what the weather was... Climbing trees outside, kicking a ball. If it was the Wimbledon season, I'd want a tennis racquet. If the cricket was on, I'd want a cricket bat. I just absolutely loved being outside.”

3. Playing as a nine-year-old girl against boys was tough – because of their parents

Jill’s early football experiences were as a member of a local boys’ team in Sunderland. She recalls that her biggest challenge was the abuse she received from the crowd.

“If I beat their precious son, I remember people shouting things at us at the age of nine, like ‘Break that girl's legs’ and ‘Kick her’. And the manager Paul Lundy - he was so lovely and he'd take me off the pitch to protect me, but he said that I always wanted to come back [to play again] on a Tuesday.”

“People have said throughout my career that I'm resilient and I'm determined. And I think from a young age without even realising what resilience even was, I had to build it up inside me, else I wouldn't have gone on to play football at any level, never mind professional.”

4. She has lyrics from one of her discs as a tattoo

Jill reveals that finding the right kind of inspiration ahead of major games has always been vital for her: “I was going to a tournament, and I got a tattoo [of this song] on my wrist because I felt like I just needed some words of motivation.”

“This song actually ended up being the whole kind of motto of how I live my life, so step by step, day by day, mile by mile, and obviously I've run a lot of miles. If I was a car, I would have a very high mileage on my clock!”

The song is Step by Step, originally written and recorded by Annie Lennox. Jill’s choice is the cover version by Whitney Houston from 1996.

5. She was thankful that she had the same initials as one of the Sunderland physios

Jill started her senior career at the age of 17 at her local club Sunderland in 2004.

Back then the women’s game had very little financial support, so even something as basic as the team’s kit was second-hand: “We used to get the men's hand-me-downs,” Jill recalls. “In pre-season this big black bag would arrive and it would have all the men's kit from the year before.”

“You’d be scrummaging through this bag just trying to find someone who had your same initials. There was this physio and he was called Jocky Scott, so it was a ‘J’ and an ‘S’ so I would find that.”

“I remember there were these red jumpers that had gone pink because they've been through the wash that many times, and we had these shorts - and obviously I was quite a tall skinny thing - and these shorts were like basketball shorts on us. But we were so happy to just take that kit home and feel like you were part of something.”

6. Jill is a huge poetry fan

“I love my poems,” says Jill laughing, “I do love my poems.”

“You know what? On Valentine's Day - that takes us back to when I first went to Aston Villa and my initiation... I had to stand up and do something and I ended up writing the girls a lot of poems for their partners. I remember them coming back to us and saying, ‘Oh, you know what, they thought that I wrote the poem,’ and all this. But I love poetry. I love it. Love it.”

“I write it now because it kind of clears my head and I love the play on words. You know how words can have two or three different meanings. I love language.”

7. A football pitch in Jarrow is named after her

“I remember the request coming through,” says Jill, when she received the invitation to the opening ceremony. “I had this picture that I was going to just rock up and open this really small, five-a-side football pitch and - Oh my God - this facility is massive, from the Football Foundation.”

“It means a lot to us, because this pitch is going to prioritise women's and girls’ football. And it's not about saying boys’ football isn't allowed, but the main priority is going to be, ‘Can we get the girls’ football on there?’”

When she was a young player, Jill remembers that the women’s team had to wait until the men and the boys had finished training before they were allowed time on the pitch.

“We want more girls to play football, but at the same time, we have to take responsibility that we create a safe environment where they can play.”

“I love the fact that all the Lionesses are going to get a football pitch [named after them] and obviously it's going to be spread out around the country. I think that's a great place to start.”

8. She got her MBE in a car park rather than a palace

“I was so honoured” explains Jill. “My phone rang and it was ‘This is someone from the Cabinet Office...’ or something like that, and I thought it was a hoax call, and they said, ‘Jill, we've been trying to get hold of you for months and months!’”

“I nearly missed the invitation for my MBE [ceremony], but it was all booked and ready to go on the Wednesday and I remember that the Tuesday was when we went into the first national lockdown for Covid, so I couldn't go and receive it.”

Instead, Jill received a card asking her to collect a package from her local sorting office. She picked up the parcel and took it back to her car.

“And when I opened it, I was like, ‘Oh, it's my MBE!’ I didn't think I was going to receive it at the Warrington post office!”