Steph Houghton: ‘That human touch wasn’t there with England. I felt let down’ | OneFootball

“There were times when I thought: ‘I don’t want to do this any more,’” Steph Houghton says as she remembers the hard years when she led the struggle to gain some parity for women in the unequal world of English football. Houghton won 121 caps for England, and captained her country from 2014 to 2021, but her most significant achievements happened far from the pitch. She worked closely with a small group of fellow players and went into battle with male executives, managers, administrators and sponsors who showed an often demeaning attitude towards women’s football.

The 36-year-old Houghton looks up, her gaze full of the fire and frustration she felt when it was difficult to make a lasting breakthrough. “I’d come in from training, having sacrificed time with my husband for a meeting, and take a call and feel deflated. You’d be like: ‘What is the point in this?’ But that’s why you need a group around you because, when you do get pissed off, that’s when someone else steps up and fights. So I’m very grateful it wasn’t just me. There were a number of people who had such a big influence on the changes we eventually made.”

Houghton is deep into an hour‑long conversation in which she also opens up movingly about caring for her husband, the former Bradford City footballer Stephen Darby, whom she married in June 2018, just three months before he was diagnosed with motor neurone disease. She also reflects on the painful end to her career and her belief that she was treated poorly by Sarina Wiegman. “When you’ve come from nothing and you don’t expect anything, to go into meetings with people that are very experienced is a difficult job,” Houghton writes in her autobiography which charts her early life in the north east before documenting her crucial role in helping to change perceptions of women’s football. “The FA [Football Association] had so much control over our money and income … we couldn’t go: ‘Just fucking give us more money’, even though it was really tempting to do that because it was ridiculous what the lads were getting compared to us.”

Houghton insists she does not like confrontation and is not “outspoken, or particularly brave”, but gross inequality forced her to take action. She reveals that, 12 years ago when she was already the best female centre‑back in the country, her contract at Arsenal was pitiful. Houghton was paid an annual wage of £4,000 which, if her bonuses and extra work as a part‑time coach and club ambassador came in, could rise to £9,000.

“I put them figures in the book because I wanted people to know where we’ve come from and where we are now,” Houghton says. “Arsenal was the best club in England and that was their level. Money was never really a driver for me. It was just about playing for Arsenal and winning trophies, but when you meet people that have got a lot more experience about what you should be earning, that’s when you think: ‘Right, things have to change.’”

Houghton gives credit to Matthew Buck, who is her agent and began advising her when he worked for the Professional Footballers’ Association. Like everyone at Arsenal in 2012, Houghton signed each new contract which was handed to her. She didn’t appreciate that she had the right to seek advice on the offer, and to reject it.

After she shocked Arsenal by insisting she wanted Buck to negotiate an improved deal, and eventually joined Manchester City in 2014, with her growing knowledge of the football business Houghton turned her attention to the international game. She describes herself as “the mainstay” of a leadership group including Casey Stoney, Laura Bassett, Jordan Nobbs and Lucy Bronze.

“When I looked at what [England’s men] were getting for commercial deals that really opened my eyes,” Houghton says. “The men and women play for the national teams of the same country and yet they’re getting 15 times more than us. How is that fair? I got the bit between my teeth and I was like: ‘OK, we need to do something about that.’ That’s what I’m probably most proud of in terms of the stuff that we did off the pitch – to change how companies thought of us as athletes and to stop them taking the piss.”

It took years of “banging your head against the wall” but Houghton and her group also finally cracked the FA. Until then, contracts had been skewed so badly that, according to Houghton, “it was 98% the FA and 2% the players – but the players felt they were privileged to have a contract at all, so they just took the money”. She adds: “The fight for World Cup bonuses was a key moment. We were going into World Cups with no [financial] incentive, no chance of getting any prize money whatsoever. But we ended up coming away with a biggish bonus for the World Cup in 2015 [when England finished third]. For girls who could never put down a deposit on a house, it was life‑changing. That set the precedent. It became a normal conversation that we would sort the bonuses out well in advance of the tournament.”

Did Houghton visualise the current state of the women’s game which, over the past few years, has been transformed in terms of exposure and economics? “It was the ideal plan but I didn’t know how many years it would take. “It’s certainly happened quicker than we ever imagined. We knew we wanted to play in big stadiums and make it accessible for people to come and watch the national team. We knew from a contract situation that we wanted girls to feel secure and be paid fairly as an England player and reward them for being the best in the country. We’ve certainly escalated it a lot quicker – but we can make it even better.”

It is a source of deep sporting pain for Houghton that she missed the euphoria of playing for, and captaining, England when they won the European Championship on home soil in 2022. A torn achilles ruined her long run in the team and, while she worked hard to make the initial squad of 30, Houghton was one of the unlucky few to be cut from final selection.

There was more hurt the following year when, while told by Wiegman to keep working, she was left out of the World Cup squad. England reached the final but Houghton’s international career had come to a sad end. She felt abandoned by England and let down by Wiegman who, Houghton says, showed little empathy or consistency towards her. “I was disappointed with the whole situation from the start to finish,” she says. “When the goalposts keep changing, it’s hard as a player to really believe in anything and trust that situation. It seemed like no matter what [Wiegman] said I had to do, and after I did that, it was never going to happen.

“If I was to ever go into management or coaching, I would always have a people-first approach. It’s important to be honest, but also to respect what a player has achieved. I would never like anybody to feel the way that I felt in that two-year period.

“I like to think if that was me in a scenario where I’d let go of a player who had done a lot over the past [14] years with the nation, I’d have those difficult conversations with her. It’s starting to go down that men’s football route in the sense that you are a number, and that human touch wasn’t there. So I felt let down as they could have done things a little bit different.”

That disappointment fades when set against the suffering her husband endures on a daily basis. MND is a harrowing disease which can rob a person of all movement and speech and make it difficult to swallow. Darby has deteriorated in recent months and he has had to undergo a percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy, which implants a feeding tube to give his body the nutrients and sustenance it needs to survive.

“You want Stephen to be living a normal life as much as possible, to be able to eat as much food as he can and get that calorie intake on board,” Houghton says.

“Over the last few months it became a bit risky having food and that’s when the decision had to be made. We need Stephen to keep weight on and to eat. It hasn’t been a great few months because these decisions are life-changing and it takes a lot of time to get used to. But ultimately it’s the best thing for him. It allows him to relax a bit more.

“There are good and bad days but I think we’ve adapted really well over the last six years. It’s obviously a tough ride but I want to be honest about the actual process and spread awareness of the disease. It’s so important we discuss the reality of MND so we can potentially help people in the future.”

Houghton admits: “In the first few years it was so hard to take in. You don’t want to believe it because you’re like: ‘Why us? We’re only young and Stephen should still be playing football. It’s not fair.’ But the more you dwell on it, the more that it harms you. So I’ve learnt how important it is to be positive.”

Darby encouraged Houghton to keep playing football after his diagnosis. “That shows how unselfish he is because he easily could have said: ‘I need you here all the time.’ I would have done it in a heartbeat. But he knew how much football meant to us and my career was not over. Even since I’ve retired he’s just so supportive. We make joint decisions so that we can move forward with my work and his foundation.”

They have long considered starting a family and Houghton says: “I’ve always wanted to be a mam, and Steve’s always wanted to be a dad. So it was always in our plans that, as soon as I stopped football, we would potentially try.” Houghton looks up as a tangled smile crosses her face. “But life gets in the way sometimes, doesn’t it? We’ll see what happens.”

Houghton is “busier than ever” as, while caring for her husband, she is “very grateful that I’ve done work at Sky and I have my Man City ambassador role, coaching and a podcast [on women’s football] with Ian Wright. When I’m going to games or having to stay overnight I feel a little guilty because I’m not with Stephen.It takes a lot out of you emotionally”.

“These last few months have been challenging because you always have that worry in the back of your head if you’re not there and something happens. You just want it to be OK but I think we’re getting into more of a routine. Our families have been absolutely unreal as we’ve got such a good support network. It allows me to do what I need to do and for Stephen to have the best possible care.”

Steph Houghton’s Leading from the Back is published by Sphere.

Header image: [Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian]