Manchester United captain Katie Zelem gave up a lot to join the club when a women’s team was reformed in 2018. But now she is preparing to lead the team out at Wembley in their first ever Women’s FA Cup final – it will be a moment she says ‘childhood dreams are made of’.
Manchester-born Zelem was only 22 when she got the call to head back United five years ago, having been in the the youth ranks for nearly a decade until being forced to start a senior career elsewhere. But she had already been a WSL champion at Liverpool and was playing abroad with Juventus, with whom she had won Serie A and got into the Champions League with a second club.
United, however, were starting out in the second tier.
“When I first signed five years ago everyone came from different backgrounds, different experiences. For me, it was my childhood club, but I’d just won the league and got into the Champions League at Juventus so it was a huge gamble for me to come back and play in the Championship,” she says.
“If you look back to where we were there to where we are now, it’s a crazy journey. I think it’s been a real rollercoaster with ups and downs. We’ve certainly come on leaps and bounds.
“From being at Leigh with some girls that have never played full-time or never had professional contracts to now being at this stage of the season competing for the double, I think it’s almost immeasurable. If in another five years we’re that far advanced then Manchester United will certainly be one of the biggest teams in Europe. I’m so proud to have been a part of the whole journey.”
Zelem, named captain in 2019 when Alex Greenwood left United for Lyon, is one of the few remaining ‘originals’ in the United squad along with Ella Toone, Leah Galton, Millie Turner. Kirsty Hanson and Emily Ramsey also joined on day one but have spent this season out on loan.
“It’s a bond that we’ll always share,” Zelem explains now. “We know that we’ve been through the same things together and different managers, different players but we’ve been there through it all and I think that’s so special.”
Just as they are in the WSL title race, Chelsea are the team that stand in the way of Zelem’s United and potential FA Cup glory this coming Sunday. The Blues are the only side that United have faced in a competitive game but are yet to beat, but the gap between them has been closing.
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