The American dream.

With America’s growth in football, many young and aspiring players are now deciding it’s best for their future careers to leave family and friends behind in the UK and travel to America to not only study, but play.

According to Statista, in the 2021/22 academic year 10,000 of America’s students were from the UK, Olivia Jayne Cross from Coventry was one of those.

After representing Coventry City Girls at youth level, the current 21-year-old decided it was time for a new chapter in her career, where she moved to Waldorf University based in Forest City, Iowa.

Olivia said,”I wanted to prove that I  deserve to play at a competitive level, an opportunity to go out to the US and play felt like a once in a lifetime experience.”

It’s not just change for Olivia, but also her family, with mum Maggie Cross having to wave goodbye to her daughter for now.

“The fear of them not being able to make friends and constantly worrying about them feeling lonely is tough” Maggie said.

Whilst the thought of playing competitive football half way across the world sounds like the dream, in the early stages,  this is not all as it seems.

“Education is completely different out here to the UK, that was hard adjusting to, somedays i would have lessons and matches on the same day.

This was made worse by some of our games being four or five hours away,” Olivia said whilst laughing.

Whilst smiling, Olivia mentions about how her team is supported locally by people inside and outside the University, stating “American football games are treated so differently, even though our town is so small it feels like the whole community is out supporting us.”

Olivia may have already completed a couple of successful years out in Iowa, but the end goal is to play at the elite level of English football.

She said,”I enjoy playing football and feel like i have so much more left to give, after I graduate in spring 2026, I hope to go home [England] and play at a professional level.”

There has been difficult moments for Olivia, but she managed to keep on proving the doubters wrong including current head coach, Thomas Goodman who didn’t give her minutes she deserved.