Emma Watson (born 28 January 2006) is a Scottish professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who plays as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

for English

Women's Super League The Women's Super League (WSL), currently known as the Barclays Women's Super League (BWSL) for sponsorship reasons, is the highest league of women's football in England. Established in 2010, it is run by the Football Association and features t ...

club

Manchester United Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

and the Scotland national team. Watson began her professional career with

Rangers A Ranger is typically someone in a military/paramilitary or law enforcement role specializing in patrolling a given territory, called “ranging”. The term most often refers to: * Park ranger or forest ranger, a person charged with protecting and ...

in 2021 and left the club two years later.

Club career

Rangers

A pupil at

Broughton High School, Edinburgh Broughton High School is a secondary school located in the north of Edinburgh, Scotland. In 2009, the building at Inverleith was replaced with a building funded by a public–private partnership. The school is currently situated next to Inverleit ...

, Watson spent five years with Boroughmuir Thistle before joining the Rangers girls' academy. She moved up to the

first team at the age of 15, making her senior debut on 15 August 2021 as a 65th-minute substitute for

Demi Vance Demi Vance (born 2 May 1991) is a Northern Irish footballer who most recently played as a midfielder for Leicester City Leicester ( ) is a city, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is ...

in a 5–0 win over

Motherwell Motherwell ( sco, Mitherwall, gd, Tobar na Màthar) is a town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Historically in the parish of Dalziel and part of Lanarks ...

in the

2021 Scottish Women's Premier League Cup The 2020 Scottish Women's Premier League Cup was the 20th edition of the SWPL Cup competition, which began in 2002. The competition was to be contested by all 18 teams of the two divisions of the Scottish Women's Premier League (SWPL 1 and SWPL 2 ...

. She scored her first senior goal for the club in the same competition on 29 August 2021 in a 4–0 win over Boroughmuir Thistle. She made 12 league appearances during the

2021–22 Scottish Women's Premier League The 2021–22 Scottish Women's Premier League was the 21st season of the SWPL, the highest division of women's football in Scotland since 2002. The league is split into two divisions – SWPL 1 with 10 teams and SWPL 2 with seven teams, following th ...

season as Rangers claimed their first title. She was nominated for the 2021–22 Youth Player of the Year at the Scottish Women's Football Awards but lost out to teammate Mia McAulay. On 9 August 2022 she signed a professional contract with Rangers. Watson was named in a match squad in the

UEFA Women's Champions League The UEFA Women's Champions League, previously called the UEFA Women's Cup (2001–2009), is a European women's association football competition. It involves the top club teams from countries affiliated with the European governing body UEFA. The ...

for the first time on 18 August 2022 as an unused substitute in the first round semi-final against Ferencváros. She made her debut in the first round final against PAOK three days later where she came on as a 73rd-minute substitute. In the second round first leg against Benfica she made another appearance, coming on in the 70th minute. In the second leg, she again came off the bench after 57 minutes and scored with three minutes of normal time remaining to take the game to extra time. The Portuguese champions scored twice in extra time to progress to the group stages of the tournament. In December 2022 she was introduced as a substitute in Rangers' win over Hibernian in the SWPL Cup final. The 2022–23 season concluded with Watson being named as PFA Scotland Women's Young Player of the Year. Rangers relinquished their league title with a home defeat to Glasgow City on the final matchday and also lost to rivals

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language * Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Fo ...

in the

2023 Scottish Cup Final The 2023 Scottish Cup final was the final match of the 2022–23 Scottish Cup, the 138th edition of Scotland's most prestigious knockout football competition. It was contested by Celtic and Inverness Caledonian Thistle at Hampden Park, Glasgow, o ...

. It was the first

Old Firm The Old Firm is the collective name for the Scottish football clubs Celtic and Rangers, which are both based in Glasgow. The two clubs are by far the most successful and popular in Scotland, and the rivalry between them has become deeply em ...

women's final and also the first final to be played at

Hampden Park Hampden Park (Scottish Gaelic: ''Pàirc Hampden''), often referred to as Hampden, is a football stadium in the Mount Florida area of Glasgow, Scotland. The -capacity venue serves as the national stadium of football in Scotland. It is the no ...

. Watson left Rangers as a free agent in June 2023 upon the expiration of her contract.

Manchester United

On 25 August 2023,

announced the signing of Watson. On 27 September 2023, the club announced that Watson had suffered an

anterior cruciate ligament injury An anterior cruciate ligament injury occurs when the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is either stretched, partially torn, or completely torn. The most common injury is a complete tear. Symptoms include pain, an audible cracking sound during inju ...

while on international duty.

International career

Watson has represented Scotland at under-15, under-16, and under-17 levels. She was called up to the Scotland senior team for the first time for a friendly double header against

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and

Costa Rica Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...

in April 2023. She made her senior international debut on 7 April 2023 starting in a 1–0 win against Australia at Plough Lane,

Wimbledon Wimbledon most often refers to: * Wimbledon, London, a district of southwest London * Wimbledon Championships, the oldest tennis tournament in the world and one of the four Grand Slam championships Wimbledon may also refer to: Places London * ...

. Four days later, she scored two goals in a 4–0 win against Costa Rica at

. She scored a third international goal as well as making two assists in her next two caps, friendlies at home to

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...

and away to

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

in July 2023 (while unattached at club level).

Career statistics

Club

International

:''Statistics accurate as of match played 18 July 2023''

International goals

:''Scores and results list Scotland's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Watson goal''.

Honours

Club

Rangers *

Scottish Women's Premier League The Scottish Women's Premier League (SWPL) is the highest level of league competition in women's football in Scotland. Its two divisions are SWPL 1 and SWPL 2. The league was formed when the Premier Division of the Scottish Women's Football League ...

: 2021–22 *

Scottish Women's Premier League Cup The Scottish Women's Premier League Cup or SWPL Cup is a league cup competition in women's football in Scotland. The Cup is open only to the teams in the Scottish Women's Premier League. There are four rounds, including the final. The competition ...

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

Report: Rangers 2-0 Hibernian - The Gers Lift The Sky Sports Cup
Rangers FC, 11 December 2022

Individual

* PFA Scotland Women's Young Player of the Year: 2023

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Watson, Emma 2006 births Living people Footballers from Edinburgh Rangers W.F.C. players Manchester United W.F.C. players Women's association football midfielders Scottish women's footballers Scotland women's international footballers 21st-century Scottish women People educated at Broughton High School, Edinburgh Scottish Women's Premier League players Scotland women's youth international footballers