Naomi Hartley (born 12 January 2001) is an English

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 defender for

Sheffield United Sheffield United Football Club is a professional football club in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, which compete in the . They are nicknamed "the Blades" due to Sheffield's history of cutlery production. The team have played home games at ...

in the

FA Women's Championship The Women's Championship (formerly The FA Women's Championship) is the second-highest division of women's football in England. The division was established in 2014 as the FA Women's Super League 2 (WSL 2). WSL 2 replaced the previous level 2 d ...

. Hartley previously played for

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

Coventry United Coventry United Football Club is an English association football club based in Coventry in the West Midlands. The team competes in the , the 9th tier of English football and are managed by Carl Nolan The club was founded in 2013 by chairman J ...

, and spent time in the youth ranks of

Burnley Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Bru ...

Blackburn Rovers Blackburn Rovers Football Club is a professional football club, based in Blackburn, Lancashire, England, which competes in the , the second tier of the English football league system. They have played home matches at Ewood Park since 1890. T ...

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

. She has been capped for England at youth level. Hartley is openly lesbian and worked alongside the Community Foundation's Empower LGBT+ programme in 2022.

Club career

Youth career

Hartley came through the youth ranks of hometown team Burnley and local rivals Blackburn before joining Manchester United's Centre of Excellence aged 13. After three years at the academy, but with no prospect of progression as United had no senior women's team at the time, Hartley joined Liverpool where she played with experienced England international

Casey Stoney Casey Jean Stoney (born 13 May 1982) is an English professional football manager and former player who is the head coach of San Diego Wave FC. A versatile defender, she was capped more than 100 times for the England women's national football te ...

, who would later become Hartley's manager.

Liverpool

Hartley made her senior debut and only appearance for Liverpool on 18 February 2018, in a

Women's FA Cup The Women's FA Challenge Cup Competition is the top annual cup tournament for women's clubs in English football. Founded in 1970, it has been named the WFA Cup, FA Women's Cup and now Women's FA Cup (Vitality Women's FA Cup for sponsorship reas ...

fifth round tie against Chichester City.

Manchester United

In 2018, Hartley was one of seven former Manchester United W.F.C. players to rejoin the club for their inaugural season in the

. She was also one of nine players to have played alongside

, who was set to undertake her first managerial role as Manchester United W.F.C.'s head coach. On 23 September, Hartley made her debut for the club when appearing as a 75th-minute substitute in a league game against

London Bees London Bees is an English women's football club affiliated with Barnet F.C. They play in the FA Women's National League South. The club has been in existence under several names since 1975, originally being called District Line Ladies F.C.. Th ...

. She made her first start away to

Lewes Lewes () is the county town of East Sussex, England. It is the police and judicial centre for all of Sussex and is home to Sussex Police, East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service, Lewes Crown Court and HMP Lewes. The civil parish is the centre of ...

on 2 December. On 8 March, she was loaned to fellow

Championship In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match system In this system ...

side

until the end of the

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...

. She was released at the end of the season.

Sheffield United

Following an initial loan spell, Hartley signed for

permanently ahead of the 2019–20 season. She made her debut in their opening game on 18 August 2019, playing the full 90 minutes in a 3–2 away loss against

Aston Villa Aston Villa Football Club is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club competes in the , the top tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1874, they have played at their home ground, Villa Park ...

International career

Hartley captained the England Under-17's during

2018 UEFA Women's Under-17 Championship qualification The 2018 UEFA Women's Under-17 Championship qualifying competition was a women's under-17 football competition that determined the seven teams joining the automatically qualified hosts Lithuania in the 2018 UEFA Women's Under-17 Championship fin ...

. In May 2018 she travelled to Lithuania as part of the squad to compete in the

finals Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of cont ...

as the team reached the semi-finals. In February 2019, she was called up to the England Under-19's to take part in the La Manga tournament.

Career statistics

Club

References

External links

Profile
at the Sheffield United F.C. website * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hartley, Naomi 2001 births Living people English women's footballers Manchester United W.F.C. players Sheffield United W.F.C. players Women's association football defenders Footballers from Burnley Liverpool F.C. Women players Women's Super League players Coventry United W.F.C. players Women's Championship (England) players English LGBT sportspeople LGBT association football players