Saluting Sigsworth – United Women's first cult hero
United Women’s 2018/19 campaign evokes many fond memories, from tense cup encounters on dark winter nights in front of sparse crowds, to those gloriously sunny late-spring afternoons in Leigh as we edged closer and closer to the Championship title, all the while attempting to chase down a century of league goals. Fun times.
Five years on, it’s not hard to recall the roster of players who took us to that inaugural trophy (and indeed so nearly the Conti Cup final), with three of those ‘Originals’ still at the club today.
But if there’s one player that’s synonymous with that particular season, in our opinion it would have to be Jess Sigsworth, who this week retired from football aged just 29, following some wretched luck with injuries.
“Jess Sigsworth knows nothing but the goal,” was manager Casey Stoney’s blunt assessment on her main striker as she first introduced us to her fledgling squad in July 2018. And how we saw evidence of that on Jess’s league debut for the Reds as she plundered in five – including a 10-minute hat-trick – away to Aston Villa.
United Women: All of Sigsworth's 2018/19 goals Video
United Women: All of Sigsworth's 2018/19 goals
Watch all 18 of Jess Sigsworth's strikes for United Women, which earned her the FA Women's Championship Golden Boot…
Remarkably proficient at holding the ball up with her back to goal, and relentless in her pursuit of harrying opposition defenders into the channels, the Doncaster-born forward was a winger in her younger years but now looked every bit a no.9; a full-time nuisance in and around the box who really didn’t know the meaning of the term ‘lost cause’.
And when the ball hit the back of the net, that pent-up tenacity always came to the surface!
“I can be a mad-head when it comes to celebrations – I’m just so relieved that I forget everything else,” she told us in her first interview for the match programme – a 10-minute chat, it must be said, that we were quite nervous about, having only seen the warrioress rampaging her way around the pitch until that point.
Jess’s demeanour away from the action therefore came as a real surprise, as she spoke so ingenuously, almost like a star-struck fan, of her excitement about representing “the club I love” and how “growing up supporting United it was always a dream of mine to be a part of its history”.
Her five-goal haul at Villa in September 2018 remains a team record for goals in one game for a single player, while her final goals return in that second-tier season (17 in the league; 18 overall) both remain all-time highs for the Reds, that even the prolific Nikita Parris couldn’t quite match last season.
It would mean back-to-back Championship titles and Golden Boots for the then 24-year-old – Jess having starred for hometown club Doncaster Rovers Belles in 2017/18 – and while the Reds’ promotion was always going to signal a step up in the quality of opponents, Sigsworth proved her worth in 20 of our 21 fixtures in 2019/20 – a dozen of which came as starts.
Her hard work on and off the ball was more apparent than ever, with so many of her best moments coming in wide areas, as Jess used her power to draw in opponents, often freeing up team-mates – most notably dangerous teen Lauren James – to take advantage closer to goal.
MU Women: History Makers Video
MU Women: History Makers
MUTV Original | Watch our film about United Women's inaugural season, which led to promotion from the Championship...
Four goals would come Sigsworth’s way throughout that Covid-hit term – the most memorable one coming in our first-ever Manchester derby win – before she found herself locked down in one of the club’s shared houses alongside Katie Zelem as the pandemic struck, with the pair cementing a close friendship over garden workouts and Netflix dramas that remains to this day.
When the WSL schedule finally returned (if not the supporters in the stands) in 2020/21, Jess again found the net four times over the course of the season. But with world-class talents such as Tobin Heath and Christen Press now within United’s attacking ranks, and Sigsworth keen to be a regular starter, a move away seemed the best outcome for all, with newly promoted Leicester bringing her onboard in July 2021.
A few weeks before her United departure, however, Jess did get to tick one big box on her career ambitions list: to play at Old Trafford, as she replaced Press after 84 minutes of our first-ever game there as we beat West Ham 2-0.
Speaking to us the following year as she returned to Leigh Sports Village with Leicester, she would reflect: “Even if it was only for a few minutes at Old Trafford and there were no fans at the game, it was special, and something I will never forget.”
Highlights: United Women 2 Man City Women 0 Video
Highlights: United Women 2 Man City Women 0
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Sadly, Sigsworth was only watching from the sidelines for that March 2022 encounter at LSV, having ruptured her anterior cruciate ligament with Leicester just a few weeks earlier.
Having previously overcome an ACL injury at Doncaster, this latest long-term set-back would come to slowly put the brakes on her playing career, with Jess lining up just once in 2022/23 ahead of her return to the Championship in July last year, as she joined Sheffield United – the club where she’d previously spent three years during her youth career.
United Women’s first cult hero, it seems like yesterday that the Barmy Army were roaring on the bustling forward, with her commitment to the United cause so appreciated by everyone who saw her.
We like to think she’ll be back at LSV at some point very soon, this time cheering on the club she supported as a kid. And when she does, you can guarantee she’ll receive the warmest of welcomes.
“Gonna score, she’s gonna score, Jess Sigsworth’s gonna score!”
Best of luck, Siggy.
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