For those who don't know, I work at Katie's former primary school and am also a good friend of her mum, Sharon. When setting up the fundraising campaign, I asked Sharon & Katie to write a little bit about her story so far...

Having already represented her country and gained several international caps for England U15's ladies, Katie is one of the only girls in Cornwall to achieve such success so early. Her football career continues to go from strength to strength but she needs our support to keep her football dream alive. As we are all aware, living in such a beautiful part of the country can limit the opportunities for our budding sports stars. The FA are supportive of the girls' food, kits and accommodation whilst on camps but they do not support the families financially so Katie’s mum has supported her throughout her journey so far. Read more about her inspiring story and her success to date...

Katie was born in Cornwall and from an early age it was evident that she enjoyed the outdoors. When she was 6 she started to play with footballs with the kids in the street. At this time, opportunities for female football players were very limited, especially in the South West and particularly Cornwall. Katie spent much of her formative years training and competing with boys. During her first full season playing for the U7 Newquay boys team, Katie won the ‘Peripheral trophy’ out of all the Newquay boys teams from U7 to U16’s for being a profound all rounder! At the same time she was training with Cornwall Centre of Excellence which was an FA based girls team.

Katie then went to train for Devon FA, as Cornwall had lost their licence and could not continue as a Centre of Excellence. Devon training was twice a week and was a 120 mile round trip, however Katie’s skill was such that her Mum committed her time and finances to her. At this time Katie could not play for a grass roots team (FA rules) so she had to wave good bye to Newquay but she left on a high; winning Managers player of the year, Players player of the year and Parents player of the year awards!

Two years ago, the FA decided to set up a National performance camp. This camp was where Elite U14 girls would train behind closed doors at Warwick University. Due to Katie’s success at the South West FA camps, she went for a trial at the first camp and then continued to be invited back on a camp-by-camp basis to all 6 of the camps. Due to living in Cornwall, this was a 6 hour journey each way so Katie and her family became reliant on Premier Inns!

Coupled with these camps and Katie's success with Newquay FC, Devon FA and South West FA camps, Katie was put forward by Cornwall FA to trial for English Schools FA (separate from the FA). She trialled at Bristol, then Thatcham Town, Berkshire and then the final trial at Stafford Town, Staffordshire. She got through all of the trails and successfully played in Manchester against the Republic of Ireland. In April 2017, representing England Schools FA, she played against Wales where she scored, Scotland and the Republic of Ireland. England managed to get to the finals where they beat the Republic of Ireland and Katie was given her first National Cap!

Katie's success continued with Newquay Godolphin FC (playing a year up for the U16 boys), Devon FA, Plymouth Argyl boys and the South West FA camps and as a result, she was selected to continue with the England camps. These are based at St Georges Park in Staffordshire.

In 2017, Katie was also selected to represent the England U15’s Ladies against Belgium and she and her mum flew out of Heathrow. A squad of 35 girls were selected and Katie was fortunate enough to play in both games and was awarded two International caps!

In February 2018, Katie was chosen to represent her country again in the UEFA tournament based against Denmark, Scotland and Spain and will represent her country in Italy in the Delle Naziro tournament in April 2018.

Recently Katie has been asked by Cornwall FA to become an ambassador for the county and is currently holding training sessions for the Wildcats, which is a girls based football session that the FA have introduced to encourage more girls to play football by 2020.

Katie is currently training with Plymouth Argyle boys and travels to Plymouth each Tuesday and Thursday. She also trains with St Agnes, Newquay and St Day U16 boys teams to maintain her fitness and stamina levels.

Looking ahead, Katie has recently been to Bristol Academy to see if this will fit into her future plans. She will leave Cornwall in summer 2018 and live with a host family and undertake a sports degree whilst training and playing for Bristol, with the aim of playing in the WSL for the first team.