Ultimate Football Heroes: Kelly Smith

Charlotte Browne's Ultimate Football Heroes: Kelly Smith tells the real-life story of a football-mad girl from Watford, written for 8 year olds who'd rather be kicking a ball than doing their maths.

What happens

It starts with baby Kelly on her dad's lap while he listens to the football results. By the time she can walk, she's dribbling a ball round the garden (and her mum's ball of wool round the living room). Her aunt brings her a doll. Kelly goes straight back to the ball.

At primary school she's the only girl in the playground games, and the boys always pick her first. She draws chalk shapes on the wall and makes everyone hit the ball inside them with one touch. She practises with golf balls, beach balls and a hacky sack. Nobody works harder.

Then it gets hard. Her boys' club has to drop her because other teams won't play if she's on the pitch. At the next club, grown-ups on the touchline shout at her to get off. And she's just a schoolgirl!

That's the bit that'll make your reader cross, and it's meant to. Kelly asks her dad why there aren't any professional women footballers at all, and he can't answer.

But she keeps going. There's a women's team where they stick her in goal because the other players are twice her size. There's a Wembley debut at sixteen where she scores against the famously unbeatable Doncaster Belles. There's an England shirt at seventeen, and a move to Arsenal, the team she's loved since she was little.

It's told like a story, with lots of chat between Kelly and her dad in the car on the way home. He's her biggest fan and he's lovely, always there on the touchline. Her mum's worries feel very real too, because back then there was no proper career in it for a girl.

The matches are exciting to read, with plenty of "GOAL!" moments. You'll also get a peek at football in the 1980s and 1990s, from video tapes of Ryan Giggs to girls playing in men's shirts.

Any child who's been told they can't do something because they're a girl (or a boy) will feel this one. It's also great for footie fans who just love a good match report.

What to read next

For another star who started out with very little, the Ronaldo book in the same series begins with Cristiano's family on Madeira, with not much money and a new baby they weren't expecting.