Grace Clinton embracing the pressure back at United after breakthrough year | OneFootball

A week ago Grace Clinton was at the Manchester Opera House collecting one of the game’s most prestigious awards, next week she’ll be in Marbella training with Manchester United, and this week she’s being chased by a stream of enthusiastic children in Macclesfield as she tries to dribble away from them with a huge inflatable football. It’s all part of life now for the England midfielder after her breakthrough campaign last season.

The 21-year-old was named as the Professional Footballers’ Association’s young player of the year after bursting – unlike that giant inflatable, thankfully – on to the scene with Tottenham while on loan last term. Now that she has returned to Manchester United, the club she signed for in 2022, after two successful loans, she is embracing everything coming her way.

“Honestly, I do feel like a new signing,” says Clinton of her summer back at United. “It’s a weird feeling of knowing a lot of the players but also coming in and feeling like a new signing, because I’ve not played with them. [But] I’ve always got on with the girls – we have a really good group at United.

“We have quality players and the club has a lot of pressure; you’re expected to win, it’s a big club, with big signings, so I think it’ll be really exciting to feel the pressure of needing to win every game. [Pre-season] has been intense, definitely hard, but we actually had some decent time off, so it’s been really nice to get back on the ball.”

Clinton is speaking after a busy but enjoyable-looking day on duty as an ambassador for McDonald’s Fun Football grassroots programme, which provides free football for five- to 11-year-olds. More than 500 children have taken part across the afternoon, helped out by the Scotland captain Rachel Corsie and Clinton, as well as by Liverpool’s Virgil van Dijk, the former England centre-back Rio Ferdinand and the Wales winger Dan James.

For Clinton, who grew up playing in an all-boys’ team in Merseyside, seeing a large proportion of girls gives her great heart: “I was literally the only girl, just surrounded by boys, so this is so refreshing to see. We want to keep growing the women’s game and being a little role model for young kids is really nice. It takes me back to those days when football was just a hobby. We underestimate how many kids might not be able to access football.”

There is nothing flashy about Clinton’s guest appearance in Macclesfield. She is accompanied at the event at Bollington United by her very polite sister, who exchanges friendly conversation with onlookers while watching the Lioness take time to sign autographs. When the activities end, the sisters thank everybody who organised the day and drive away in a modest, unostentatious car. If you weren’t to know, you might not have realised she was an international footballer, except for the moments when she was skilfully nutmegging players with ease while being followed by eager videographers and multiple camera crews. In short, she appears to be taking her on-pitch success in her stride.

Yet life is inevitably changing rapidly for Clinton, especially since her debut for England against Austria in February, when she scored and played a starring role in an emphatic 7-2 victory. After playing at Wembley in April in a Euros qualifier against Sweden, she is hoping to be selected for Wembley friendlies against Germany and the United States in October and November respectively. “It’s just addictive, that Wembley feeling,’ she says. ‘You just can’t explain it. It’s the most surreal thing to play in front of so many people and it feels like home.”

Before then, she is set for her long-awaited competitive debut for United, which could be at Old Trafford in their WSL opener against West Ham on 21 September, after next week’s warm-weather training camp in southern Spain, of which she says: “I’m expecting a lot of running and a lot of football – I think we’ve got double sessions lined up.” The head coach, Marc Skinner, has big plans this season for Clinton, who is expecting to be deployed in a more box-to-box role.

“We’ve played a couple of friendlies and he’s spoken to me and said: ‘I want you to play like that this season, I want you to get goals.’ And he just wants me to be up and down the pitch, creating and stopping. There are loads of things I’m working on, so many things I can improve. I want to add more assists, more goals and be able to get up and down the pitch, to break the play up, and put in loads of tackles. So I think position-wise it’s more defensive [but] I’m going to be up-and-down as well.”

Clinton scored four goals and provided four assists in her 20 WSL appearances for Tottenham to help them finish sixth. Reflecting on receiving the young player award, she says: “It was very special. We play in the best league in the world, so for the other players around me to vote for me, I think it’s one of the most meaningful awards, it’s really special. I’m just taking it all in. I’m just really happy at the moment.”

She was the only member of the PFA women’s team of the year to attend the awards ceremony in Manchester, owing to the rest being overseas on pre-season tours, and this level-headed youngster seems more than ready to continue flying the flag for the women’s game.

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