Mary Rose Phillip (born 14 March 1977) is a former English international

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 ...

and a football team manager who manages men's

Kent County League The Kent County League is a football competition based in Kent, England. The league has seven senior divisions – a Premier Division, Division One East and West, Division Two East and West and Division Three East and West. It sits below the So ...

team Peckham Town. A versatile player, she played in all four positions at the back and also in midfield. Phillip captained

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, the first black player to captain an England women's international football team, and until 2011 was the only player to represent the country in two

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...

squads. During her playing career she had 65 international caps. She enjoyed a successful club career with Millwall Lionesses,

Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandsworth ...

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

and

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

. After retiring as a player in 2008 she became a team coach and manager and in 2020 became the first female manager of a cup-winning men's senior side.

Early life

Phillip was born and raised in

Peckham Peckham () is a district in southeast London, within the London Borough of Southwark. It is south-east of Charing Cross. At the United Kingdom Census 2001, 2001 Census the Peckham ward had a population of 14,720. History "Peckham" is a Saxon p ...

and is

biracial Mixed race people are people of more than one race or ethnicity. A variety of terms have been used both historically and presently for mixed race people in a variety of contexts, including ''multiethnic'', ''polyethnic'', occasionally ''bi-ethn ...

. Her father was a bus driver of Saint Lucian descent, and her mother was a primary school teacher of Irish origin. Phillip was keen on football from childhood.

Career

Club career

Phillip joined Millwall Lionesses as a 12-year-old, then moved to Fulham as a professional in 2000; she was one of the first 16 UK women players to turn pro. Phillip became the club captain at Fulham, for whom she lifted The FA Women’s Cup in front of 10,000 fans and 1.9m viewers on BBC Television in May 2003, the season Fulham completed the treble. Phillip’s strength and composure at the heart of defence brought reassurance to her teammates and she was always on hand to provide some advice to the younger members of the squad. She was a strong player for

Arsenal Ladies Arsenal Women Football Club, commonly referred to as Arsenal, is an English professional women's football club based in Islington, London, England. The club plays in the Women's Super League, the top tier of English women's football. Arse ...

in central defence and was with the club for four years after joining from Fulham Ladies in July 2004. Her central defensive partnership with

Faye White Faye Deborah White, (born 2 February 1978) is an English former footballer who captained Arsenal Women in the FA Women's Super League and is the longest-serving female captain of England to date. Her Lionesses career spanned 15 years and five m ...

was key to Arsenal's unprecedented success, both domestically and in Europe. At the end of the 2007–08 season it was announced that Phillip would be leaving Arsenal Ladies. She later joined Chelsea Ladies in time for the start of the 2008–09 season. In October 2008 Phillip retired from football at the age of 31.

International career

Phillip made her England debut whilst with Millwall Lionesses, playing in the same team as current national coach

Hope Powell Hope Patricia Powell, CBE (born 8 December 1966) is an English former international footballer and former women's first-team manager of Brighton & Hove Albion. She was the coach of the England women's national football team and the Great Britain ...

in 1996. As an 18-year-old she received an unexpected call-up to the 1995 World Cup squad; she was pregnant at the time. Phillip won six caps then spent four years (1998–2002) out of the international set-up while having her two sons. She returned in early 2002 and subsequently captained England in two international friendlies against Sweden in February 2006 when

was absent with an ankle injury, then again captained England in the absence of her teammate Faye White, who suffered a cruciate ligament injury at the start of the 2006/07 season, when they overcame France to secure passage to the World Cup in China. She was the first black player to captain an England women's international side. After being named in the squad for China, Phillip became the first English player to feature in two World Cup squads. In February 2008 Phillip was one of a record eight Arsenal players who started in England's 2–1 friendly win over

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. She won a total of 65 caps for the national side.

Coach and manager

After her retirement as a player in 2008, Phillip became a coach, completing her A licence in the 2010s. In 2019 she became manager of Peckham Town, her local club, where she had coached first the Under-18s and then the senior squad; in 2020 they won the London Senior Trophy, the club's first cup win and the first for a senior men's side with a female manager. In 2021, she will be assisting Lydia Bedford in coaching the England women's Under-18 team as part of the Elite Coach Placement Programme.

Honours

Player

Arsenal *Women's Premier League: 2004–05, 2005–06, 2006–07, 2007–08 *UEFA Women's Cup: 2006–07 *FA Cup: 2004–05, 2005–06, 2006–07, 2007–08 *Premier League Cup: 2004–05, 2006–07 *Community Shield: 2005–06 Fulham *Women's Premier League: 2002–03 *FA Cup: 2001–02, 2002–03 *Premier League Cup: 2000–01, 2001–02, 2002–03 *Community Shield: 2002–03, 2003–04 Millwall Lionesses *FA Cup: 1996–97 *Premier League Cup: 1996–97

Manager

Peckham Town *London Senior Cup: 2019–20

Personal life

Phillip has two sons and two daughters. She has

multiple sclerosis Multiple (cerebral) sclerosis (MS), also known as encephalomyelitis disseminata or disseminated sclerosis, is the most common demyelinating disease, in which the insulating covers of nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord are damaged. This d ...

, diagnosed in 2017.

References

External links

Mary Phillip
at The FA website {{DEFAULTSORT:Phillip, Mary 1977 births Living people English women's footballers England women's international footballers English people of Saint Lucian descent English people of Irish descent Black British sportswomen Millwall Lionesses L.F.C. players Fulham L.F.C. players Arsenal W.F.C. players Chelsea F.C. Women players FA Women's National League players 1995 FIFA Women's World Cup players 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup players Women's association football defenders English football managers Footballers from Peckham