this year\u2019s Challenge Cup.<\/a> She has featured in all but one of the Spirit\u2019s NWSL games this season as the Michele Kang-owned team seem on course for a second consecutive runners-up finish in the regular-season standings.<\/p>\nFor England this summer in Switzerland, she came on as a substitute in the dramatic quarter-final win against Sweden and started in the semi-final victory over Italy. In total, she played 170 minutes of England\u2019s triumphant tournament.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re not playing consistently at club level, then you\u2019re never going to be able to compete to get minutes for England,\u201d she says. \u201cSo being able to come here and show my level week to week, while also improving in the things that me and the England coaching staff had discussed that I wanted to be better at, helped my opportunities to be able to get minutes with the national team.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really pleased with how this move has transpired, because I\u2019m not sure that, had I stayed in the situation I was in, I would have even made the squad for the Euros, let alone being able to get onto the pitch during the knockout stages, which was such a privilege and so much fun. I\u2019m proud of myself for making that step and taking matters into my own hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
This year, the Spirit trail only Kansas City in the regular-season standings and Morgan is optimistic.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a team, we obviously set out at the start of the season to make the playoffs, but you always have in mind wanting to finish in the top two, so that you can have a home run up to the Championship, like we did last year, because those were some of the most enjoyable games in my career,\u201d Morgan says.<\/p>\n
\u201cA packed-out Audi (Field), 20,000 people, is such an incredible atmosphere; so loud, so much fun, and gives you such an advantage in those knockout, competitive games.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m proud of how we\u2019ve progressed through the season, because we were quite consistent at the beginning of the year, but I feel like we\u2019ve really nailed that down and been performing to a high level over the last few weeks, so peaking at the right time, hopefully, and optimistic that we can carry that into the playoffs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgan is just one of five English players in the NWSL but the only English player on her team. With many of the squad living in close proximity to each other, however, planning social activities is straightforward, she says, with regular trips out for coffee and group activities, such as a recent paint night.<\/p>\n
\u201cI joke with Sandy (MacIver) because she\u2019s half-English, half-Scottish, although she claims she\u2019s 100 percent Scottish, but she got one cap for England,\u201d Morgan says of her teammate who represented England in a 2021 friendly before switching allegiance to Scotland, qualifying through her Scottish-born father.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a good job we\u2019ve got each other, to be honest, because our sense of humor is slightly different from some of the Americans, but as long as there\u2019s one of us there to back the other one up and just laugh no matter what, then we can get away with most things.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\n Esme Morgan (C) celebrates with teammates after beating Spain in the Euro 2025 final. (Matthias Hangst\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
With the 13 other NWSL teams dotted around the country, Morgan has seen plenty of the U.S. already, but her favorite away trip is to Los Angeles for a game against Angel City FC.<\/p>\n
\u201cCalifornia just has this feel to it, with the palm trees and the good weather, it\u2019s just got a little bit of an aura about it,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really liked Portland and Seattle as cities, too. They reminded me of the cool parts of Manchester in the Northern Quarter, because they\u2019re just quite edgy, cool-looking buildings. Some of the cities feel kind of the same, like through the middle of the country, but all of the West Coast cities have a lot of character.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like the Jags in London, Morgan has found a second home in Washington and, like her NFL team, she has boosted her international appeal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ask someone why they support a sports team and the reasons can vary; proximity, family connections or, sometimes,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7819,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[8094,8215,116,118,121,117,119,8216,8214,8217,8218],"class_list":["post-7818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-england","tag-international-football","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-jaguars","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-nfl","tag-nwsl","tag-washington-spirit","tag-womens-euros","tag-womens-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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