Alessia Russo: ‘When you join the club, you take on a part of Arsenal and the love’
Alessia Russo said she celebrated on the 9km parade through the red smoke-filled streets of north London after Arsenal men’s Premier League triumph and Arsenal women’s Champions Cup success, and she wants to push on for more trophies, starting with the WSL. "I had the time of my life that day," the Arsenal forward said of the parade and its atmosphere.
The forward, often labelled an honorary Gooner, conceded she was not an Arsenal supporter before joining the club but described how the experience of being at Arsenal made her adopt the identity. She recalled a family photo in which a childhood shirt was jokingly photoshopped from Manchester United to Arsenal and said the parade was “one of the most amazing things I’ve ever experienced.” Russo pointed to teammates Lotte Wubben-Moy and Leah Williamson as example supporters she enjoyed sharing the day with.
Russo painted the parade as a vivid scene with “faces everywhere, on every balcony, rooftop, bollard and traffic light, of all ages, races and religions,” and noted the presence of many young girls compared with earlier decades of Arsenal parades. She said she soaked in the celebration of the men winning the Prem and the women’s Champions Cup success, calling the day “just a really really special day.”
Off the pitch Russo has pursued work to expand access to the game, launching her own foundation earlier this year and helping to launch the fifth year of Starling Bank’s Kick On initiative, which links local businesses with girls’ teams and subsidises front-of-shirt sponsorship. Starling commissioned surveys of 1,000 adult female football players, 1,010 11-17 female players, 501 small- and medium-sized business leaders and 1,092 grassroots football coaches, and found that nearly every grassroots female football club (97%) said their team needed more funds.
The Starling research also reported that 76% of female players said they will have to drop out of their team or the sport altogether if more funding isn’t secured in the next five years and 40% of female players said their team doesn’t get the same amount of funding as male teams. On those figures Russo said: "They are quite damning statistics, which is such a shame considering the growth that we see in the women’s game." She added: "Over the last five or six years, the growth has just been incredible, but there’s still work to do at the bottom to build it up."
Warning that a lack of grassroots funding risks losing future talent, Russo said: "I always say you never want to miss out on the next Leah Williamson or Lotte Wubben-Moy, you don’t want to miss out on talented young players just because they haven’t got a local team or the team that they were at folds." She reflected on her own pathway and friendships from grassroots: "If local businesses can invest in one team, you never know, you might help produce a superstar who goes on to have an incredible career who will always remember you being a part of it. There’s more to it than just investment, it’s that you can really have a say in a core part of these young girls’ journeys and lives."
With no major international women’s tournament this year Russo took a period of rest and personal time, saying: "It was really important that I did have some proper downtime." She said she "shut down for about two-and-a-half weeks and just enjoyed time with friends and family," but also described solo training routines, family-holiday sessions and attending the England v Panama game in New York, plus Toonie’s [England teammate Ella Toone] hen do and wedding.
Reflecting on a season many judged to be a step up for her, Russo remained measured about individual form and focused on team goals: "I’m obviously pleased with my season for Arsenal and England from a personal point of view but, ultimately, I’ll always judge it on the trophies that we win." She said Arsenal had learned a lot and were "really hungry for the new season," adding: "We’ve made it quite clear that we want to do everything that we can to be the team most capable of winning the WSL and Renée [Slegers] has set the standard really high this pre-season. We’ve got seven new players that have come in, we’ve got a squad that’s raring to go, the competition in it is really high."
Russo concluded by outlining her immediate objective with club and country: "So yeah, I feel happy but now I really want to continue to push on with Arsenal and England and win some trophies."