IFEOMA DIEKE ARTICLE

Professional footballer Ifeoma Dieke is real-life Gregory's Girl

IFEOMA DIEKE was only two months old when Gregory's Girl hit the cinema. So it's perhaps no surprise that the young footballer's life story sounds like something out of a movie.

But the Scotland international's real life rise to success is more amazing than anything film makers could come up with.

Because while she may have started off her footballing career on the school football pitch in Cumbernauld like Gregory Girl's Dee Hepburn, and became a success in ladies football like Bend It Like Beckham's Parminder Nagra and Keira Knightley, she has gone on to outshine her fictional rivals.

Ifeoma is currently in training for the new football season in America, where she will be the only Scots woman in the US professional league and the rock of the Chicago Red Stars' defence.

The 27-year-old, who has been playing amateur and semi professional football around the world since she won a prestigious scholarship to a college in Miami when she was a teenager, can't wait for the new league to kick off.

And she admits that having grown up in Cumbernauld, she is always getting compared to Gregory's Girl, which was set in her home town in 1981.

She said: "When I started playing, the boys would say that girls can't play football and that we would be an embarrassment to the team.

"But once you get the ball and could skin them and nutmeg them a couple of times, you get respect.

"And when I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I always said I wanted to be a footballer but people told me I wouldn't be able to do it for a living.

"But I'm a professional footballer now, and it's the best thing in the world.

"I'm really excited about the new league, it should be fantastic and I can't wait for it to kick off.

"We start pre-season training soon and it'll be great to get going.

"In America nobody has really heard of Gregory's Girl, but in Scotland people talk about it all the time because I'm from Cumbernauld.

"I don't mind though as it's a good film and it's an easy comparison for people to make."

Ifeoma is about to make the move to Chicago from her current home in Miami, where she has been mostly based since she was recruited by the Florida International University soccer team, the Golden Panthers. But her journey to the top in football began in much less glamorous surroundings.

Although she was born in Massachusetts to Nigerian parents Ken and Edith Dieke, they moved to Cumbernauld when she was three, and she only ever remembers growing up in the Lanarkshire new town.

She also has a west of Scotland accent broader than Dee Hepburn and John Gordon Sinclair put together.

When she was eight, she started playing with the St Mary's Primary School team, and soon impressed local coaches who recruited her to the Cumbernauld Cosmos girls' side.

She was then picked up by Cumbernauld Ladies, which is where the scouts for FIU spotted her, and set her on the road to international success.

"I can't really remember when I first played football, but it's always something I've loved doing," she said.

"Nobody in my family had played, but I always loved it.

"When I was in primary three or four, the girls would get to play rounders while the boys got stuck into football, but I always thought it was unfair.

"I enjoyed playing with friends, but then a few years later, I started at St Mary's Primary, and got to play for the school team. I did alright and I loved getting a game.

"There was just me and two other girls on the team, and the boys didn't like it, but when we played, they realised what we could do, and I was just another player.

"A girl can be just as good as a boy at football, and they welcomed me with open arms when they saw what I could do."

In 1999, she got the dream move to Miami. She recalled: "When I got the scholarship, it was so amazing.

"My mum was delighted, she and my family had always said I had to study, that football was going to be a hobby and I would have to get a real job.

"But I got the scholarship, and I have a degree as well, which makes them very happy and they are very delighted for me.

I'm very lucky and am so pleased with what I have been able to do." Despite having lived in the US since she was a teenager, and having been born there, Ifeoma said that when it came to international football, there was only ever one country she was going to represent - Scotland.

With African parents, and an American passport due to her place of birth, she was also eligible for Nigeria, and despite interest from the all-conquering Team USA, who won the Women's World Cup in 1999, Ifeoma didn't need much time to think about her international honours.

She said: "I was born in Massachusetts and am also eligible for Nigeria, but I've only ever been there once when I was a kid, and all my memories are of Scotland - it's my country.

"In 2004, I was concentrating on getting into club football, but the Scotland coachVera Pauw called and asked me to come along to a training camp in Greece. I went along and had a great time.

"A month later, I got a call from the US coach, and she invited me to a training camp in April. But it was going to clash with a match Scotland had against Ukraine which was going to be my first game for my country.

"I decided I'd go to the US camp, but a week before it, I told them I wasn't interested, because you should be excited about playing for your national team and I just wasn't. There was only one team I really wanted to play for, and that was Scotland.

"You've got to go with your heart. It has to be an honour and a privilege and I just knew Scotland was the team for me." Since then, Ifeoma has gathered 43 caps as the heart of Scotland's defence, but it is her club career that is about to hit the next level.

After being a star for the Miami-based Panthers for several years, and graduating in 2003, she also got to enjoy a first, brief, taste of professional football with the former pro team Atlanta Beat.

She was signed up to the side in the Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA), but unfortunately for her, the team folded along with the rest of the old women's league just a few months later.

In that time, she played twice against Scotland team-mate Julie Fleeting, who had just beaten her to become the first Scots woman to play in America with rivals, the San Diego Spirit, a year earlier.

Wusa folded in 2003 due to financial problems, shortly after Ifeoma's side Atlanta had lost the final championship game in extra time, but a restructuring of the sport in the last six years has led to the creation of the all new organisation, Women's Professional Soccer (WPS), which is launched in April.

Ifeoma has spent the time since her brief pro stint wisely, however.

She has been working all around the world, playing for successful sides in the Swedish and Cypriot womens' leagues at various times of the year. But every international footballer wants to be a professional, and Ifeoma said she is delighted to be back.

She said: "It was great to play with the Beats. To play in a professional league was amazing, and it was nice to go up against Julie a couple of times.

"But I can't wait for the new league to start. I knew when I signed for the Beat that the league might not last long, but I thought I would have to try it as I might never get another chance.

"So to actually get a second chance at playing professionally is amazing.

"How many girls get to live out their dream of growing up to play football for a living? This is what I've always wanted to do, and I'm going to make sure I enjoy every minute of it.

"There are a lot of Scots expats out in America, so hopefully they'll come along and cheer for us." Ifoema joined the new league last year, and when she was placed on the roster for the drafts, she was among the first picks for her new side, the Chicago Red Stars.

Red Stars head coach Emma Hayes told Record Woman: "Effie is an international class defender who has experience at the highest level.

"She is fast, reads the game very well, and is composed with the ball at her feet.

She is a gem." While she is about to embark on her latest adventure, Ifeoma always keeps her eye on the women's scene in Scotland.

She said: "Julie Fleeting has done so much for the Scottish game, playing in the US and getting so many goals for her country. It's been great for girls who want to play, because they can see the senior team and realise they can play football if they want to.

"Celtic have their ladies side, and now Rangers have one as well, so it's all going well, but we need more men's clubs to get behind the league for it to get stronger.

"But I'm not sure if I'll ever come back to play in it, I have been living in Miami for the last 10 years and I get to train in the sun every day.

"I don't think I could cope with the Scottish weather."

By Brian McIver Daily Record