Able Ava Looks To Assist With Magpies County Cup Progress

The Magpies Women turn their attentions this weekend to County Cup action as the first team travel to Beaconsfield Town whilst the development side will make the trip to Holmer Green (both 2pm kick offs on Sunday). 

 

First team manager Ed Jackson-Norris may have some selection dilemmas, not least with regard to teenager Ava Broke-Smith - a new face around the Development team this season who made her first team debut last weekend and impressed from the substitutes bench in the 5-0 victory over Keynsham Town. 

 

Ava - who considers her strengths her “speed and stamina and being able to play a variety of long and short passes in a game” - started playing football when she was 4 or 5. She has plenty of role models in the squad, given that her older sister Payton is attached to the club and first team captain Sarah Thompson just happens to be her football coach at school. 

 

The talented youngster added: “My preferred position is in the forward line acting as a striker, but I do also enjoy playing as a winger, so that I can drive forward with the ball and pick out someone in the box.” 

 

“It has been football all the way for Ava who recalled: “The first club that I ever played for was a local grassroots team in Somerset called Bishops Lydeard where I played on the boys’ team, but then moved over to the girls side eventually. Whilst playing here I also joined an FA skills team to get in all the football I could. Then I played for Exeter City when I was younger for 4 years before moving from Somerset. When I moved up to Berkshire, I played for Reading development and stayed there for 6 years. Alongside this I played school football.” 

 

So for a teenager, Ava has plenty of soccer experience under her belt already and she is enjoying the opportunity to develop her skills at MUWFC. She added: “I joined Maidenhead because I was looking for a new challenge that would push me to become a better player to achieve the things that I want to. Having both a strong development team and a first team gives me the aim to strive to make my way up to the first team at some point. Already having the opportunity to play with the first team was an amazing opportunity for me and I am very excited for the future at the club.” 

 

Whether it is with the Firsts in the BBFA Senior Cup or with the Devs this weekend in the BBFA Trophy, Ava has another opportunity to stake her claim and demonstrate her undoubted ability.