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2007
Enjoyment The Key For Goal-Grabbing Zoe
by Jeremy Ruane
Catching up with Zoe Thompson is not the easiest thing to do, as any defender can well testify. But the chance to get goal-side of one of New Zealand's most prolific markswomen finally materialised at Wuhan Airport, on her 24th birthday.
“I'm living my dream right now”, beams the Auckland native proudly. “Playing for my country at the Women's World Cup Finals … the whole experience has been out of this world.
“I think we knew it would be big, but I don't think we realised just how big. The Chinese crowds have been fantastic. They've added so much atmosphere to the games, and to get such big crowds at games in which the Chinese team isn't involved is just incredible.
“The people have been wonderful, and have looked after us really well. People in the streets have been really excited to meet players. Where else in the world, short of the USA, would have offered this sort of experience? It's been a dream come true, it really has”.
A dream which was a far cry from Zoe's mind when she first kicked a ball in anger, in 1990. “I had a family friend who coached his son in a midget team. One of their players suffered a season-ending injury, so he asked me if I wanted to join in, and I never really looked back.
The Devonport resident was a North Shore United starlet during her formative years. “I enjoyed the best of both worlds one season, playing with the boys at Shore while playing in a girls team at Forrest Hill-Milford United”.
Soon after, Zoe started to make her mark in Shore's women's teams, and her development was such that she had forced her way into the New Zealand U19 squad and been named NZ Women's International Young Player of the Year in 2001 before so much as kicking a ball in the Northern Premier Women's League.
That opportunity materialised in 2002, when Shore gave their young women's team their head. Their fourth-placed finish at the first time of asking owed a great deal to their rising star's 14-goal haul, out of the team's total of 23 - the free-scoring Miss Thompson was very hot property indeed.
A move to the other side of the Harbour Bridge was inevitable for her personal footballing development, and in her only season with Ellerslie, she struck 22 goals and picked up a runners-up medal in the 2003 National Knockout Cup.
The Ellerslie team broke up at the end of that campaign, and the next move in her career has been her most satisfying. “Playing for Three Kings United has been tremendous fun”, says the scorer of 67 goals in just three seasons with the club.
“We've developed a strong team culture and a good bond with the players, so that's been really great. I've greatly enjoyed the friendship and the fun of playing for TKU, as well as being a really good, competitive team.
“Winning the league with TKU twice in a row has been pretty cool”, grins the fifth most prolific markswoman in the club's history. “This season's campaign was particularly memorable, because the league has been really competitive - there has been more than two occasions during the season when you could look forward to a good competitive match. Sadly, I haven't won the National Knockout Cup - yet!”
But she has twice won the National Women's League with Auckland's “A Team”, initially in 2003. “Winning the NWL last year was great - a really good season. I enjoyed the final, not only because I scored in it but because we avenged our loss to Capital Soccer from the year before, which was pretty painful”.
The “A Team”'s lethal number nine won't be around for this year's competition, however. Instead, she'll be having a break from the game while completing her law degree at Ghent University.
“It's worked out really well for me”, says the Auckland University student, “as it gave me the last semester off Uni here, so I could concentrate on football training up to the World Cup and write my dissertation for honours in that time.
“Then, no sooner are we back home from the World Cup then I head to Belgium to study law for one semester as part of my scholarship. It means I'll miss the National Women's League, but I'll be back at the end of January, raring to go for our Olympics campaign”.
That's something which Zoe is really looking forward to. “The Women's World Cup and the Olympics have been my biggest goals. My biggest ambition has always been to represent NZ at the Olympics. As a little kid, you know about the Olympics, and the amazing honour it is to represent your country and be an
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  Living the dream - Zoe in full flight against China in Tianjin at the 2007 Women's World Cup Finals
photo courtesy www.jamesprickett.co.uk
Zoe Thompson's Favourites
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Olympian”.
As well as the goal frames inside which she regularly puts the ball, the jet-heeled striker has another target in her sights. “I've had a bit of an up-and-down international career, starting some games and not others. I'd really like to work hard to get my place in the starting eleven, so that's another goal for me”.
Learning she had made the Women's World Cup Finals squad was an ordeal in itself. “John Herdman had told us that he was only going to call the people that didn't make it, so when I picked up the phone and he said, “Hello, it's John here”, my heart sank.
“It was very late in the day when he was supposed to be telling people, and I thought to myself, `Surely he's not ringing me now to tell me I'm not going'. It turned out he only wanted a few other people's phone numbers off me … “and by the way, you're in the squad”!!”
Thrilled? You'd better believe it! “A fantastic moment - really exciting!” beams Zoe with pride. “It was such a great thrill to know that you're going, but there's also a mixture of emotions when you find out the team.
“You feel for the players who don't make it, and although you're really happy to be going, you know that all of the people who were in line deserved to go - you can't not spare a thought for them”, she says, an acknowledgement of how close her front-running rival, Michele Clarke, and her Three Kings' team-mate, Rebecca Sowden, were to being part of the twenty-one-strong Football Ferns squad.
There's no doubt in Zoe's mind which has been her most memorable goal to date. “My first one for New Zealand, a diving header against Tonga in Papua New Guinea. And I always remember the goals I've scored against Lynn-Avon United - they're definitely the most satisfying and enjoyable goals to score”, declares their arch-rival's goalscoring queen with a wicked grin!
“I guess the thing I enjoy most about scoring goals is feeling that buzz that goes through the team as you're celebrating with team-mates. And it's especially satisfying to score if the defenders have been giving you a hurry-up during the game, or supporters have been yelling at you from the sideline - it's nice to silence them with a goal”.
Glenfield Rovers' coach, Peter Buchanan, is one person Zoe is keen to acknowledge as a significant influence on her career. “He's always been there for me, encouraging me, helping me out if I ever wanted to go for kicks in the park, etc.. A great friend and coach”.
Another influence is her boyfriend, Mark. “He's amazing - he puts up with so much, and is really supportive. Away from soccer, I mainly want to spend time with him. We love to go out and do stuff together, e.g. surfing, get out to the beach as much as possible, snowboarding - my other passion, but that has to take a back seat during winter due to soccer. If the time is right, that's something we like to do as well”.
But Zoe has no doubts whatsoever as to the source of her continuing enjoyment of the game she loves. “My team-mates and other players over the years have been the biggest influence of all. I'm a firm believer that you have to enjoy something to do it well, and without them I wouldn't enjoy my soccer.
“If it wasn't for the friends I've made, I don't think I could have stuck at it. They're the ones that make training worthwhile. Every day you have to get up and go, they make it fun, and help you through if you're having a bad patch by encouraging you”.
Zoe is open-minded about her future prospects, on and off the park. “After completing my law degree, I'll be starting work for Chapman Tripp, a big law firm, next year. It's a good place to start my career, and commercial law is a good field of law in which to start, but I don't know whether I'll stay in it forever.
“I'd love to work for an international organisation, e.g. the EU, the UN, some sort of international law tribunal, working for the NZ Ministry of Foreign Affairs … that sort of thing would be a dream job for me, because in terms of law at present, I think international law is my passion.
“A lot of those jobs are based overseas, of course, so they might have to wait while I'm still playing soccer in and for NZ. But there are lots of things I'd be happy doing.
“I just want to try my best at whatever I'm doing at the time, and to a degree, live in the moment, and enjoy whatever's going on in my life at any present. I'm excited by the future, and I like knowing that there are several paths which my life could take”.
Including that towards the opposition's goal, a path which Zoe Thompson knows better than most.
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