How many football supporters can say they’ve scored a crucial goal for THEIR club in a local derby at the home of the club’s local rivals in a competitive game that REALLY matters?
Step forward, Emily Joyce.
Emily, who recently celebrated her 24th birthday, is Derby County through and through.
She’s now in her sixth season playing for the club she loves and her standout moment on the pitch will take some beating.
It came on Sunday 3rd October 2021 as Derby County Women recorded an impressive victory at the City Ground against local rivals Nottingham Forest.
They were 2-0 winners on the day, with Joyce scoring the all-important opening goal to swing the pendulum of the contest firmly in Derby’s favour.
Charlotte Clarke in the Ewes goal had earlier saved a penalty from Rosie Axten before Joyce’s big moment arrived.
A long ball forward from defence by Sarah Jackson appeared to one that Forest’s goalkeeper would easily claim. Joyce chased what was pretty much a lost cause and her efforts were rewarded when the ball was punched into her path inside the box by the onrushing home shot-stopper.
With the goal gaping in front of the Trent End, she didn’t need much time to bring the ball down and fire it into the back of the net. It happened in the blink of an eye.
Joyce set off on a sprint up the pitch, evading the attentions of five of her team-mates before Megan Tinsley eventually got hold of her to give everyone the opportunity to celebrate as a group.
Ellie Gilliatt scored direct from a free kick later in the half to seal a memorable win against Derby’s fierce rivals. What a day it was for Sam Griffiths’ side.
In what was a desperate 2021/22 season for Derby County, with the club in administration and facing an uncertain future, the Ewes offered a beacon of light and shoots of positivity in the most testing of times.
For Joyce, though, she got to do something that, frankly, anyone with a Derby County association would love to do.
She bleeds black and white and having the Ram on her chest for training and matches carries a weight of expectation of pride which she revels in.
“Amy Sims and I probably feel it more than most in terms of what it means to play for Derby County as supporters and especially in the local derbies,” Joyce said sitting in the press conference room at Moor Farm Training Centre ahead of another evening training session.
“To score at the City Ground was massive for me. It was the first goal of the game, which was important, and I went off running like mad! It wasn’t even a good goal!
“We did the double against them that season. It was a real highlight for me to contribute in that way.”
Was it her career highlight to date, though?
“It was my best moment on the pitch,” she quickly replied with broad smile, clearly reliving the moment in her head.
“Winning the Player of the Season Award last year was so special though because I know, in my position, you can go under the radar a little bit by doing the simple things and winning the ball back. To be recognised by the staff means a lot to any player.”
Joyce grew up as a supporter watching Derby from the Pride Park stands with her parents.
Her dad is a converted Leeds United supporter, whisper it quietly, but if his allegiance needed to be proved then rumour has it he passed the test with flying colours when Derby were victorious in the Play-Off Semi-Finals at Elland Road in 2019.
“It means so much to me and my family to be part of Derby County,” she said with a strong element of pride in her voice. “Playing for the club, being on Radio Derby talking about Derby County and stuff like that is nice.
“We’re part of the club even more now as the Women’s side so when you’re at different places around the stadium and you’re seen around the place as a team is nice. We’ve all got Season Tickets too so to come more frequently on a Saturday is lovely. I want to support the team myself because I am Derby through and through.
“It means more as you get older too. Maybe you appreciate it more and know you’re something of a role model to young girls, I am not sure, but it feels special to represent Derby County.”
Going back to that win at the City Ground in 2021, it was perhaps fitting that Joyce got to enjoy her career high point after going through such a tough time to get there in the place.
In 2019, only days after being named as the Fans’ Player of the Season for the 2018/19 campaign, she suffered the three dreaded words that any player shudders to hear: Anterior. Cruciate. Ligament. Or, as we know it, ACL.
She suffered damage whilst in action at the Don Amott Arena in Mickleover, while it was still a grass pitch, and she immediately knew the signs weren’t good.
At the time she was on an internship at Moor Farm Training Ground with the club’s Sport Science Team. She was deserving of the opportunity and is still somewhat irked that fellow students felt she was selected because she played for the Women’s team rather than for how she interviewed for the position.
After being on such a high, she had a dramatic low inside the space of a few days to deal with.
“I’d had a good season and I was so happy with how my first season in the team had gone,” she recalled.
“I got ‘megged’ by someone and I turned around feeling frustrated to push off to go in for a tackle. As I planted my leg in the ground, I felt something pop in my knee.”
Incredibly, despite such a severe injury, she still managed to walk off the pitch. In a way, it’s not a surprise, as Joyce is made of tough bloody stuff.
However, that offered something of false hope too that the injury was not as bad as first feared.
“I have seen people coming off the pitch with an ACL injury screaming and in agony,” she said. “I pride myself on being quite tough, though. I knew something wasn’t quite right but didn’t think it was so severe.”
There was talk of lateral or collateral damage to the knee but, after undergoing a scan, her worst fears were confirmed.
A lay-off with an ACL injury is typically between 9-12 months. Some come back earlier, some longer. Either way, it wasn’t going to be a quick fix.
“At that stage I hadn’t heard loads about ACL injuries,” Joyce said. “It wasn’t until I did mine that I became really interested in it.
“I didn’t feel right with my knee and I felt it was bad as it kept locking out of place, but when I got the results I was just gutted. I knew I wouldn’t be back as quick as the professionals, so I knew I had a long road ahead.
“Within a month of the injury I had the operation, which was June 2019, and I was doing all my rehabilitation work from that point.”
Joyce then had the challenge of working her way through the gruelling rehabilitation period.
Not being active was one of the biggest challenges. Anyone that has seen Joyce play will know she’s a bundle of energy and covers every blade of grass so, being restricted to very little exercise and mobility early on was hard.
Facing a year out of football, what was her first thought?
“I remember going home to my mum and saying: I don’t want to get fat!” she said before bursting into a fit of laughter.
“I don’t know why I said that! I think it’s because I am quite an active person. The thought of not doing anything worried me.”
Looking back now, Joyce admits she found going from the emotional rollercoaster of being named Player of the Season to missing the whole following campaign hard to deal with.
She was only 19 at the time and lived and breathed football. She still does, but she has other things in her life now too which required her attention.
Griffiths suffered a similar injury in her career, so she was in good company to take advice and someone who understood and could relate to the challenges she was facing.
Despite feeling involved, Joyce felt lonely. She was part of things, but she wasn’t.
Joyce said: “Sam was great with me as she had also had the same injury, so she was able to pass on her experience.
“It was hard though because although I felt involved, I wasn’t really. I wasn’t available to play. It is only towards the last part of the rehabilitation that people want to know a bit more about how you’re doing because you’re close to being back. That’s everywhere, though, not just here.
“It was hard, but everyone was so nice. No matter how hard you try, you don’t feel part of it.”
She added: “I didn’t go to watch that many matches if I am honest. I knew I wasn’t much use. No-one knows if you’re not there either. It can be frustrating watching too because you want to be out there.
“They signed Sherry McCue to come in and take my position which I found really hard as well. You do wonder where you fit back into things.”
Joyce switched off from football to a degree. She had two holidays in the months after the injury and her family, who she is very close to, were as supportive as you’d expect.
She was at University in Derby and, ironically, studying a Strength & Conditioning and Rehabilitation Degree. As well as having her studies to focus on, she was also learning about her injury almost by the day and it enhanced her interest.
She also followed the progress of Arsenal duo Rob Holding and Jordan Nobbs from the Men’s and Women’s sides respectively as they documented their returns from the same injury.
After pushing herself through various milestones, which she had listed on her phone and still does to this day, there was another hurdle to overcome - COVID-19.
Joyce had enjoyed her first training session back with the group when the pandemic hit. That said, despite it being a blow and the side’s 2019/20 season concluding null-and-void, it was a blessing in disguise.
“Every time I accomplished something it felt good; running, kicking a ball again, getting involved in training,” she said.
“It felt like having had the injury didn’t matter as much as no-one was playing then but after seven months, I was desperate to play!
“It felt a blow at the time but, as it turned out, it was probably the best thing that could have happened for me. It gave me more time to get back, to get myself prepared. I wanted to rush back after eight months out. When I look back, it helped back more as I was just starting the transition process.”
When Joyce did return, she felt in good shape.
Her first full season back in the fold, following the COVID-19 impacted 2019/20 and 2020/21 seasons, was in 2021/22.
She said: “I felt really good when I came back and I was probably in my best condition physically too.
“I feel I’m a reasonably fit person anyway, but I did feel really good. I had set my mind on coming back fitter and better than ever.
“I didn’t have my best seasons but was still getting good minutes and I was pleased with that.”
The 2022/23 season was, by her own admission, her best so far.
A regular in the heart of the midfield, she struck up a strong partnership with Molly Sutherland. The pair combined brilliantly in the middle of the park as the team enjoyed a positive season.
“I think my consistency was my biggest thing last year,” she said. “I remember one of my old managers saying a few years ago that I was always a seven out of ten, at least, and that makes me feel like I bring something to the game.
“I have tried to stand by that and always try to be at least a seven out of ten. I remember discussing it with my mum and saying that’s the lowest I can be. I am always pushing to be higher.”
As she approaches her mid-20s, Joyce is still far from being a senior player - but last year’s squad was so young that she had the added responsibility as being one of the more experienced members of the group.
It was, perhaps under the radar, something she enjoyed. Passing on her experience and someone the others in the dressing room looked up to was a new position to be in.
“I felt I had a responsibility to step up as we had such a young squad,” she said. “We have a few more experienced heads this time around so it’s different again this year.
“There was a good togetherness and chemistry in the group last season. I just really enjoyed it.
“On a personal basis I could get on the ball and win it back. I felt I started the season well and I had some nice messages and compliments from the staff early on. I felt confident because of that and I took it into the rest of the season. I hold onto words like some of the ones I received.
“The staff say things to me like: ‘you do the easy things well’. I know it’s important to keep doing that. I like to pass forward but if we need to look after the ball then we will do that.”
For the current campaign, what does she need to do to take her game to the next level?
The Ewes are playing a slightly different system so far this term which means a slight adjustment to Joyce’s game and she is playing a little higher up the pitch.
“It depends where I am playing really,” she said. “I am playing in the ‘eight’ position right now and I want to get on the ball as much as I can. I like getting my tackles in and being involved in the game.
“I need to demand the ball more. If I am playing as an eight, I want to get getting assists and contributing at the top end of the pitch. I want to chip in with some goals along the way. That is the main thing.”
Another challenge for Joyce this season will be the increase of training days for the Ewes, which has stepped up from two evenings a week to three.
Joyce combines her football with a full-time job as a PE Teacher and she admits it can be a difficult balance at times.
“We’ve gone from two nights to three and the summer holidays have flown by so, once I am back at work in September, it’ll definitely be more testing,” she said. “I am funny with what I eat before training and I try to be sensible during the day and what I do ahead of training.
“It will take some adjusting, although I know it is only one extra day. We are training a bit earlier too in the evening which is good but it means less time before you’re back out the door again!
“What’s nicer is it means getting to bed earlier. I know the girls agree too as it can take a while to wind down and especially after you’ve had a tough training session. My head can be pounding and you struggle to sleep, then you’re up the next morning early doors.
“Saturday is meant to be your day of rest and then it becomes the day of planning and certainly for lessons and stuff like that. It’s crazy-busy at times but it’s all worth it.”
Reflecting on her career journey to date, it has been typically full of ups and downs and Joyce has had to put in the hard yards to get to where she is today.
The ‘Marlborough Dribble’ kicked off her love for football at the age of five. It was only dribbling with the ball around some cones and poles, but it sparked an interest which remains strong to this day.
She laughed: “All you had to do was dribble around with the ball. After that I was hooked! I got a scarf and a football for it too. I was crazy for football from that moment.”
Marlborough Rovers was Joyce’s first football team and her story is symptomatic of girls’ football in the 2000s and early 2010s in the fact she had to play and train with a boys’ team until the cut-off point of around 12.
“I am glad things have progressed a bit more now and there’s more girls’ teams at a younger age,” Joyce said.
“When the girls’ team eventually came in I was playing on a Saturday for the boys and a Sunday for the girls.
“I trialled for Derby County Women’s Centre of Excellence, I think it was Under-11s or Under-12s, and I stayed with them up to Under-17s.”
Joyce’s next step saw her study at Solihull College and also feature for Birmingham City in their Development Squad after leaving school.
She lived in Solihull with a host family who fed her and a fellow student ‘crappy food’ and watered down the orange juice. Home comforts must’ve felt a million miles away.
That fellow student was Ellie Brazil, who now plays for Tottenham Hotspur Women, and Joyce is proud of her friend’s career to date which has seen her also turn out for Birmingham City, Fiorentina and Brighton & Hove Albion.
“It was quite an experience,” she said. “We had to complain to the college about the food situation. I took my own food in the end and we used to go out once a week so we didn’t have to go back!”
Joyce trained with Birmingham’s Academy during the week and played for the Development Team on a Sunday, as well as appearing for the College side on a Wednesday.
In the second year of college, she moved back home and got the train to Solihull four days a week. She appreciates the effort and expense of her parents during that time, particularly before she learned to drive to provide her own independence.
She said: “I was a bit like an athlete; training and playing twice a week. To experience all that was really good.
“In my first year I got to train with the first team. When I walked through the door to the dressing room, Karen Carney was sat in there. I was starstruck as the England team had just come back from the World Cup where they were runners-up and she was part of that group.
“In my second year I got more involved with the first team and was training with them more regularly.”
After finishing college and entering her third year with Birmingham, Joyce needed to know where she was at.
She was given a squad number for the first team but just wasn’t getting the opportunities she craved.
“When I had chances, I felt I did OK,” she admitted. “I am quite an honest person and if I wasn’t doing well, I believe I’d say so.
“I played well in friendlies. One of the coaches would big me up but then I’d feel like I was forgotten about. I felt I trained well too but there was always someone ahead of me. It was strikers they always needed, not a midfielder!”
With opportunities few and far between, a return to Derby arose.
Griffiths had been Joyce’s manager in the Centre of Excellence a few years beforehand and the relationship between them both was still there.
She didn’t need any convincing where her next step would be and a homecoming was the perfect opportunity.
“I made the decision to come back to Derby at that stage,” she said. “I wanted game time and to be playing regularly. I was at University in my first year and I had realised it wasn’t going to be ‘football’ for me in terms of a career. It was going to be ‘football and something else’.
“I didn’t have an agent and I still don’t. I had spoken to a few people and I could have stayed at Birmingham, trained with them and played in the Development Team but I felt I was getting older and needed game time and Women’s football.
“I remember messaging Sam and she had been to watch me a few times. She came to watch a WSL Academy Final at Birmingham. I am so grateful she put her faith in me to come back and be a player in her team and for Derby County.”
The rest, as they say, is history.
She’s closing in on 100 appearances for her club, as well as chipping in with a healthy return of 16 goals.
Joyce has established herself as one of the first names on the teamsheet and picking up the shirt with the Ram on it is not lost on her.
“I know we aren’t playing at the highest level, but it is quite an achievement because not many people can do it,” he said.
“This is a big club and I am so proud to play for Derby County and represent the club. I know my family are really proud too.”
She’s right.
Not many people can do what she and the small number of individuals to have played at the highest level in their field for Derby County have done.
Joyce has, and is, living the dream. She plays for the badge every time she steps onto the pitch and is making memories to last a lifetime.
No matter what happens in the years to come, she can look back on what she has achieved with a huge amount of pride.
And that goal at Forest will ALWAYS be there too!
