Women’s Pyramid: Craven set to live out Champions League dream with Wrexham
Wrexham will enter the UEFA Women's Champions League for the first time this season, an opportunity goalkeeper Liz Craven has waited her whole life for.
Wrexham will venture into the UEFA Women’s Champions League for the first time this summer, and their goalkeeper Liz Craven is already relishing the opportunity.
Next month the Cae Ras (Racecourse) will be hosting the mini-tournament that constitutes the first qualifying rounds of the competition. Wrexham, the champions of Wales’s Adran Premier, will face Pryunik of Armenia, while Glentoran of Northern Ireland take on Riga FC of Latvia.
The winners of each match then face off in the final, and the victorious team will progress to the second qualifying round, to be held at the start of August.
Craven, speaking exclusively to Dragon Football, admits with some understatement: “The draw is quite complicated.” When it was taking place, she was on her way to training, so she was listening to it unfold, but says she had no preference when it came to an opponent.
“I think it’s just exciting to be playing in the Champions League anyway,” she says. “Whatever team we get drawn against: cool!”
‘The Welsh league is a new challenge’
The 25-year-old has had a circuitous route to the top. As a youngster she played for Everton and moved on to Manchester City, and then spent time at Stoke City and AFC Fylde, in the third tier of the English game.
“I felt quite comfortable in the English leagues and I’ve been at a few clubs where we’ve been in relegation battles. I was quite confident in the fact that I knew what the English league was about.”
Joining a club just across the border had not necessarily been something she had planned, but it made sense. The North-West of England is a footballing hotbed, with a lot of very good players competing for places at just a few clubs. Additionally, she had a long journey from her home near Chester to get to training and matches in Fylde.
“When Wrexham came in and wanted to have a chat to me, it was good in the sense of the travel distance, it was convenient for me, but also it’s a new challenge and I really needed that because I’ve been in England for quite a while and the prospect of going to Wrexham in the Welsh League was just a different challenge for me, which was really nice.”
She signed for Wrexham in 2024, just after their first season in Wales’s top flight.
“If you’d have told me in two years’ time at that point that I’d have been in the Champions League, I’d have probably laughed and been like, ‘No way, there’s no chance.
“But to be fair, the first conversation I had with the club, one of the first things that they mentioned is that the big aim for the women’s side was to qualify for the Champions League. From the get-go, that was the objective and the goal. I just didn’t expect it to happen so quickly, I suppose.”
‘Wrexham is a unique club’
When Wrexham were challenging for promotion from the second tier Adran North in 2022-23, they had already made it plain that if they reached the top tier, they would be offering semi-professional contracts to players, and have moved towards a more professional set-up ever since.
Most notably, last summer, the experienced Jenny Sugarman was appointed as first-team head coach, following spells as head of academy at Leicester City, manager at West Bromwich Albion, and assistant at Aston Villa. Her recruitment and her vision led Wrexham to their first league title, breaking Cardiff City’s run of three crowns in a row.
With former Burnley head coach Rebecca Sawiuk as her assistant, they attracted some top-quality players to the club, including Newcastle United’s record goalscorer Katie Barker, Pakistan international Mariam Mahmood, and Jodie Bartle, who was promptly appointed as captain.
And what’s on offer at Wrexham for their female players is something that Craven never thought she would experience.
“Ever since I was a kid, it’s always been my goal to be a full-time pro, like a lot of people. [In] the English leagues, unless you’re in WSL, there’s obviously not the same sort of investment.
“So I think Wrexham is a really unique club in the sense that they really invest in the women’s game and they do it with intent and purpose. Because they’re not just throwing money around aimlessly to say that they’re investing. They’re really doing it with a bit of thought.
“That’s really been so impactful on everybody working within the club because I think that it’s really escalated how quickly we’ve managed to progress and grow and make it into the Champions League.“
She points at the problems that continue to plague clubs beyond the spotlight in England: Plymouth Argyle’s move away from semi-pro status, Cheadle Town Stingers closing down their first team, Forest Green Rovers opting to close down their female pathway to focus on getting their men back into the league.
“One day you’ll have a really positive story, but then it’s overshadowed by four or five negative stories,” she says. “It’s nice to be at a club where the investment feels consistent, and you feel quite secure in the fact that it’s not going to just go away and it’s not a flash in the pan.”
‘We have a target on our backs’
And speaking of avoiding flashes in the pan, Craven is already focused on pre-season and planning to defend their league and cup double, having also won the Adran Trophy thanks in no small part to her own heroics in a penalty shoot-out against Cardiff City in the final, saving two spot-kicks.
Indeed, a domestic Treble was not too far away, with Wrexham losing 2-1 to the Bluebirds in the semi-final of the Bute Energy Welsh Cup.
Still, two pieces of silverware in the trophy cabinet means a very successful season.
“It was incredible for us to firstly win a trophy because Wrexham had never won a domestic trophy like that before last season, but to win a double was just incredible. I think it’s a privilege to be in a position to have to defend those trophies.”
But she acknowledges that Wrexham’s high profile means they will be the team that everyone wants to beat, in whichever competition they are contesting.
The women’s team have featured in the docu-series ‘Welcome to Wrexham’, following the progress of club owners and Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mac, and though that celebrity has brought the club more fans, more investment and more success, it has also brought more pressure.
“It will be a different mindset from us this season because from a pedigree perspective, we’d never won a trophy, so we were sort of the underdogs,” says Craven.
“[Now] we’ve won them. We’ve been there and done that. We’ve got a bit of a target on our back now. So it’s going to be a different approach and a different mindset going in, knowing that we’re defending the trophies that we’ve already won, rather than trying to take it off someone else.”
The approach and mindset are all on the to-do list for pre-season, with plenty of discussions around team values, and reflecting on what the group’s ambitions are.
With another competition thrown into the mix, it will be important for Wrexham to stay focused and ensure they are physically fit enough to compete on all fronts.
And of course there’s some admin every player needs to make sure she’s got in hand. Like everyone else at the club, Craven is hoping that they’ll need to have their passports at the ready for the next rounds of the Champions League, which will likely necessitate a trip abroad.
First of all, they’re counting down to playing hosts in the first qualification rounds.
“We’re all excited to be able to represent the community and the club in the Champions League,” she says. “We’re starting pre-season really early so we can prepare for the Champions League and then prepare for the league, but I guess it’s what you want to do as a player.
“I think that everyone who came to Wrexham had the aim of playing in the Champions League, so we’re seeing that out!”
All photos provided by Dan Purdle and Wrexham AFC.