Liverpool’s Olivia Smith: ‘I started taekwondo for self-defence. That also contributed to football’ | OneFootball

It is hard to comprehend the level of pride Olivia Smith’s dad, a Liverpool fan from Ontario, must have felt when he made his first visits to Anfield this season and his daughter scored three times in two games. They had been nurturing her skills together since she was three years old at a Just For Kicks session in her home town of Whitby, near Toronto.

“My dad was so invested in football. He put me into every sport, but football was the one we felt was ‘the one’,” says Smith, who was routinely playing for age-group teams that were two years up. “I didn’t fully commit to football until I was about eight or nine, as I was torn between taekwondo and football, but my dad just saw something really special in me.

“I always enjoyed going in net for like small-sided games. I thought it was fun, but for the most part I was always a forward. I grew up watching YouTube videos of Marta and Christine Sinclair, every day before a game. I wanted the ball and I always wanted to score goals. Sometimes I’d even just take the ball from my teammates and go and score a goal.”

She recalls being bullied by kids at junior school – “I’m sure they’re regretting that now,” says Smith, who became the youngest player to make a Canada debut, aged 15, in 2019 – and she believes martial arts have helped shape the player she has become.

“My favourite was the sparring,” she says. “Initially, I started taekwondo for self-defence. That also really contributed to football, just with power, discipline and attitude. The type of training I did was absolutely brutal. I remember times when I was crying in pain, just from all the work I was doing, but it paid off.”

Liverpool admired Smith’s talents so highly that they decided to spend a women’s club-record fee of £210,000 to sign her last summer from Sporting. Smith says she is “absolutely loving” her time in England and her family’s affection for Liverpool helped made the decision easy. “I had a pretty good season in Portugal and Liverpool came with an amazing offer and to top it off my dad is a massive Liverpool fan. When Matt [Beard] was initially here he brought me in, we had a great conversation and I felt this environment would be the best place for me to grow.”

The 20-year-old forward has scored seven times in 20 appearances in all competitions, including in six league games, three of which in particular will be in the club’s history books. She became the first Liverpool woman to score at Anfield in the Women’s Super League era, when opening the scoring against Manchester City in October, and scored twice against Manchester United in March to give the women’s team their first WSL victory at the ground.

“It was unreal,” Smith says of their 3-1 win over Manchester United. “We were just so determined. As a team we hadn’t won at Anfield before and that was something that was just driven in our mind. We wanted to show who we really are.”

With four league games to go, Liverpool are sixth, and they are through to the semi-finals of the Women’s FA Cup; on Saturday against Chelsea they attempt to reach the final for the first time in three decades. Reflecting on her first season in England, Smith says: “There are some major names in this league and before coming I was like: ‘I know it’s going to be physical, the pace is going to be 10 times different’. I find it similar to the national team intensity, which is something I really needed in my game – more consistency at that speed.”

Since Beard left at the end of February, the interim head coach, Amber Whiteley, has overseen three wins from five matches in all competitions, starting with three wins in a row, including the 1-0 win at Arsenal in the FA Cup quarter-finals.

“We worked our butts off in that match,” Smith says. “Amber’s been amazing. We started off really well, we just gained a lot more clarity on what our roles were. Changing the formation adjusted to a lot of our unique qualities as individuals to come together, so the 4-3-3 was definitely something that was needed. I love going one-on-one, just the creativity, especially for the midfielders. We have some talented quality in there, and training has been great.”

It is understood about 500‑600 Liverpool fans will make the trip to Kingsmeadow Saturday’s, which is a home tie for Chelsea as neutral venues are not being used in the semi-finals. Chelsea are chasing a quadruple, having already lifted the League Cup, and are in the last four of the Champions League while sitting six points clear at the top of the WSL. Smith says: “Chelsea has a bunch of players that I’ve looked up to since I was young. They have such a deep roster, a lot of quality, but if we’re having a good day, we can win. We have so much quality and talent within our team as well.

“I’ve never been to Wembley. We want to play at Wembley. That’s our determination and drive this week.”

Header image: [Photograph: Nick Taylor/Liverpool FC/Getty Images]