Queen's of the Kingdom: Meet East Fife's Player/Manager Liz Anderson
On Sunday, East Fife, the lowest ranked side left in this season's Scottish Cup welcome SWPL Hearts to Bayview, a day which player/manager Liz Anderson hopes can help a community flourish.
“Football didn’t really start for me until after I’d left school. I’d moved from Lanarkshire to Fife and I didn’t really know anybody so decided to join a team. I ended up at East Fife and loved it.”
The rest, you could say, is history.
I’m speaking to Liz Anderson, player/manager of third tier East Fife, the lowest ranked side remaining in this season’s Women’s Scottish Cup, ahead of Sunday’s Fourth Round tie against SWPL Heart of Midlothian.
“It was very different to what it is now.”, recalls Anderson as we begin a conversation that will preview Sunday’s tie but also covers the growth and fragility of football in the lower tiers, accessibility in sport and the importance of having a voice in the right places as more and more new eyes turn towards the women’s game, “We were a pretty decent team but it was more about the social aspect of it. A team full of people from all different walks of life, with different levels of money and ambitions. As a youngster it taught me a lot about how to make friends.”
Growing up football would always feature in the forefront of Anderson’s mind but it looked as if the hockey field would be where she would leave her sporting mark having been picked out by St. George’s, an all-girls school based in Edinburgh with a pedigree for developing talent with stick in hand, following an impressive display in an inter-schools contest.
“I was the little rough kid in amongst all these well to do people.” shares Anderson. “I always hated school and never would have went if I had the choice, but that move certainly helped change the course I was on for the better.”
“I played at district level as well, and I had the opportunity to join clubs and push on to national level but as much as I loved hockey I knew football was the thing I was always keen on.”
Having broken through at East Fife, Anderson would then spend time at local rivals Raith Rovers and current SWPL2 side Boroughmuir Thistle before an innocuous back injury, picked up during her spell at the Edinburgh side, suggested she may never be able to play again.
“I had to get surgery. The vertebrae and discs at the bottom of my back were shot. I was desperate to play. I couldn’t run, I couldn’t turn. I was losing power all the time. The only way I could sleep was by doing it in my car as it was the only place I could be comfortable. Fortunately the surgery made things immediately better but there was still a risk attached if I had decided to return to playing.”
“During that time I was still coaching at East Fife and one day I thought I’m going to have a wee go, and I’ve been kind of doing both since then really.”
Anderson’s day job sees her working locally on Active Schools programmes while in football, and when her schedule allows, she has also been involved in SWNT youth team coaching set-ups supporting the likes of Pauline Hamill, Pauline MacDonald and more recently Girls’ and Women’s Performance Manager Michael McArdle, as the Scottish FA look at new ways to shape the future of Scotland’s national side.
That involvement with the national team has seen Anderson, who holds a UEFA A Licence, experience football at the very highest level and she admits that for as long as she can stay involved (and get the time off work) she’s keen to keep on learning but it is when our conversation returns to Levenmouth, where she lives, works and plays football that the tone of our conversation becomes more focused.
“In my day job I see stats every day. Levenmouth has the highest population of kids that can’t swim because the opportunity or cost is a barrier, that’s just one example but it prevents kids from nursery all the way up to adulthood participating in sport.”
“We pride ourselves in finding ways to remove the barriers for those kids as a football club.”
“I’ve had opportunities to move into coaching in other areas but I think living in the area that the club is in, there is a big element of being involved in trying to make that difference on your own doorstep.”
“Look, I’m a mega-competitive person and I love winning and trying to find new ways to be better, and there are players at East Fife who feel that way too, but for me there is still a need for young players, in places like Levenmouth, to have football clubs. To have access to coaches who can help them reach their potential but also to find a space for those who just want to play for fun.”
“I don’t know if a club can necessarily do everything but you can see where those worlds can work together and that’s what we’re trying to do.”
The side that competes in the third-tier SWF Championship today can trace its origins back to the start of the new millenium and local couple Arthur Robertson and Margaret Wight. Both have since passed away but such was their impact a summer tournament is regularly held in their memory and it would be they who began the process of moving the then named Kirkland Ladies, under the East Fife umbrella.
“I don’t really understand how they got involved in football, I’m not even sure they liked it, but they were interested in community politics and making sure something was on offer for a pretty deprived area. They worked tirelessly to make that move happen and for the club as a whole.”
“The men’s club board at the time was probably one of the first to identify the benefit of having a women’s team and they were part of that.”
Whilst East Fife have remained stable during Anderson’s time a quick look across the rest of the region shows the fragility still at play in the Scottish women’s game with side’s from Kelty, Dunfermline, Aberdour and Kirkcaldy all having intermittent spells in and out of the game while this season has seen another wave of mid-season withdrawals across the country.
Since the 20th December 2023, Edinburgh City (a former Championship rival of East Fife), BSC Glasgow (who had competed in the tier below) and Dundee United’s U18 side all withdraw from the women’s game, at short notice and leaving whole squads of players in search of a new home.
“Sometimes when the money gets tight the first thing to go is the women’s team”, says Anderson in a frank but honest assessment of the challenges that face the game, “These are players that might have spent their entire time at one club. Don’t get me wrong there are still places where players will still be able to go (three of those affected by Edinburgh City’s demise have found their way to the Fife coast) but it’s not very often they’re all going to move together. It can effect friendships and it’s tough for anyone to go through.”
“It can feel a little bit fragile at our level, but what I will say is that where there is a youth pathway that can sustain a senior side. if a player moves away somebody from underneath can then come up into their place.”
“I’ll be honest if we hadn’t invested in the idea of a full pathway then we might not still have a team but it’s also important to recognise that a player moving because they have got into university or got a job can be something to shout about too, especially in areas of the country where that isn’t always seen as the norm.”
Anderson believes that across Fife at least, corners are starting to be turned, but one of the ways in which the 40-year-old would like to see women’s clubs protected is with a more consistent voice in the boardroom, the impact of which she has seen first hand as an Associate Director for the side currently competing in SPFL League Two, the fourth tier of the men’s game.
“At times we have probably had to have difficult conversations with the wider board at East Fife but they’ve been possible because they wanted somebody from the women’s team in the room to be able to input and share learnings. There’s no token effort. They’re genuinely interested.”
“I think if we are looking to increase the skillset within women’s football then being involved in that environment can only help. I was pretty naive about how much goes into running a club when I first joined and even at the level East Fife operate at I was blown away.”
“That’s not to say that they can’t learn things from our side too and if you are a club saying you are genuinely invested in women’s football then you need somebody with that voice in the room. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a woman just as long as the women’s set-up has a voice at that higher level.”
In recent seasons East Fife have led somewhat of a yo-yo existence and having been relegated from SWPL2 at the end of last season they currently sit fourth in the SWF Championship having won their opening four games of 2024, including a 5-0 victory over league rivals Renfrew in the previous round of the cup at the start of the year.
“At our very best we’re good enough to be an SWPL2 team but then when life, working shifts, all those other things come in its hard to build consistency and that’s without taking into account the fitness and form of players.”
“The Championship is a great league to be involved in and for me it’s about giving the girls the opportunity to be competitive and win games perhaps over where I would like to take the club to just now as maybe we aren’t quite ready for that.”
“At the start of the season we probably didn’t have the squad exactly where we wanted it to be, the back four featured me at 40, and then a 15-year-old and a 16-year-old alongside me.”
“At first team level it’s really not all about me and it’s probably the first time I’ve been happy with the entirety of the team of people working at the club.”
“Johnny (Harrow) and Stuart (Hay) have been great in terms of style of play and recruitment and then bringing in Mark (Grant) as a goalkeeper coach…we’ve never had so many girls wanting to play in goal!”
That coaching team faces their toughest challenge to date as one of the country’s full-time side’s Hearts arrive for a contest where a number of those lining up for The Fifers will never have come up against opposition the quality of Eva Olid’s side.
“We want to make it as competitive as possible but we’ve got to be realistic. I’ve been fortunate to play with and against some of the best players in Scottish football and when I’m an old lady I’ll look back on those memories fondly, even the odd annihilation, but I think we’ve got to see it as an opportunity and to enjoy it.”
“For our club it’s a big thing. All the kids are excited about seeing Hearts, I kind of wish they were just as excited about seeing us but there will be youth team national players, people you see on Sportscene every Monday night. It’s an experience thing for them and even people who maybe aren’t that into football in the local area have been asking about it.”
With more and more of Anderson’s focus going towards building the pathway at the club, a role which has also seen her recently take on the U12’s side, and with a long term objective of pushing the first team to become an established SWPL2 side, time seems to be ticking on her playing career.
“I shouldn’t really be playing now if I’m honest.” she laughs, “the plan was for me not to play this season. I had started picking up more niggly injuries and I’ve had issues with my achilles. Sometimes I watch footage back and wonder if people will end up remembering me as the person that can’t run but in my head this season will be the last although Johnny and Stuart have already started asking me about continuing to help some of the younger players.”
“Last Sunday was the first time I started on the bench and it didn’t niggle me as much as it did in the past. My head and body have pretty much made their mind up but I love football, I love East Fife and I would never want to see them struggle so we’ll see what comes next.”
East Fife host Hearts in the Women’s Scottish Cup Fourth Round with a 12:30 kick off at Bayview Stadium.
To gain access to all our features, exclusive interviews and insight on the big issues and big games, please consider a paid £10 monthly subscription or a £50 annual subscription (£75 if you are feeling super generous as a founding member), starting with a 7-day free trial, to continue the growth of informed and unique coverage of the women’s game in Scotland.