Rachel Yankey features in episode 20 of Sky Sports' My Icon series
Thursday 19 October 2017 13:33, UK
Rachel Yankey insists women’s football has "come on leaps and bounds" since she first entered the sport.
The Londoner is still called Ray by some of her friends and former team-mates after cutting her hair short in a bid to fit in with the boys' team she was playing for as an eight-year-old.
After beginning her football career at Arsenal, Yankey would go on to become the country's first professional female footballer after moving to Fulham Ladies.
She represented Team GB at the London 2012 Olympics, and rewrote the history books a year later when she broke Peter Shilton's record of 125 international appearances to become the most capped English football of all time.
"Women's football has come on leap and bounds since I first started where people really didn't accept the sport and didn't know a lot about it," Yankey says in Episode 20 of Sky Sports' My Icon series.
"Now you're seeing it on TV - the viewing figures are in the millions especially when the England team does well and gets to a World Cup, or for the [Women's] FA Cup final.
"I would never have thought that in the Olympics you would have 70,000 people coming out to watch a women's football game at Wembley. The FA Cup finals are now at Wembley - these are amazing things that have changed.
"Before I joined Arsenal, I couldn't have told you that Arsenal had a ladies team, I couldn't tell you that England had a women's team, I didn't know any of that.
"I couldn't have named any female players and I think that has changed now. Kids have role models and they can now see that women can play football. I think that's quite special."
Yankey talks about her journey in the latest instalment of My Icon, which premieres on Thursday at 7am on Sky Sports Mix and is available On Demand. The episode is repeated on Thursday at 1pm and 10pm.
Coinciding with Black History Month, Sky Sports' #MyIcon campaign brings you 31 exclusive interviews with top BAME sports personalities across the month of October. For more information click here.
