GEMMA HAS A GREAT FOOTBALL PEDIGREE

Gemma Smith (left) and Salma Bi

WE know a lot about our guiding light Salma Bi, but what about GEMMA SMITH, manager of the Birmingham Women's Futsal League and founder of the new SPORTING PATHWAYS initiative?

Gemma has a distinguished background in football as a goalkeeper, even though she is a more than useful outfield player.

She first joined a club aged 11 when she was scouted by BIRMINGHAM CITY - the club she proudly supports.

Gemma was at Birmingham from the ages of 11 to 16, also being chosen to represent the Birmingham County Centre of Excellence from 14 to 16.

The highlight of Gemma's career came when she was selected for the England Under-17s squad following a successful trial.

She was in the standby squad, and while she did not progress any further, it was still a fantastic achievement of which she is rightly very proud as there was a lot of high-class competition in that age group.

As a senior, Gemma was also at Coventry City for two seasons.

As her career in the leisure industry developed, Gemma found she had less time for football, but the game still plays a massive part in her life.

She recently earned a promotion to become technical manager of the Birmingham International Futsal Arena. Gemma also co-ordinates the ever-growing Birmingham Women's Futsal Leagues.

She said: "When we started off in March last year we had just two teams, but now we've got three divisions and 18 teams. I've been involved in ladies football for a number of years so managed to attract a lot of players that way, but also through advertising on networking sites like Facebook and word of mouth."

Gemma is really looking forward to August 25 when the 20-hour Non-Stop Futsal Marathon is attempted at the Birmingham International Futsal Arena.

In March, 40 girls were booked to attempt the 10-hour marathon but only 24 turned up and they gloriously succeeded.

Gemma explained: "We're going to need a minimum 40 this time. We'll be playing from 4am to midnight, so there will be a lot of effort to put in, but we're really looking forward to it and are confident we can achieve it."