Elizabeth Christina Mary Durack (born 20 May 1994) is a former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who last played as a

goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...

for Chelsea of the

FA Women's Super League The Women's Super League (WSL), currently known as the Barclays Women's Super League (BWSL) for sponsorship reasons, is the highest league of women's football in England. Established in 2010, it is run by the Football Association and features t ...

Early life

Durack was born in Australia, to an English mother. She was the only girl on her school's team.

College career

In 2013, Durack took up a place at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

to study human development regenerative biology and play for the

Harvard Crimson The Harvard Crimson are the intercollegiate athletic teams of Harvard College. The school's teams compete in NCAA Division I. As of 2013, there were 42 Division I intercollegiate varsity sports teams for women and men at Harvard, more than at ...

soccer team.

Club career

Western Sydney Wanderers

Durack played alongside

Chloe Logarzo Chloe Logarzo (born 22 December 1994) is an Australian professional soccer player who plays as a midfielder for Western United in the A-League Women on loan from Kansas City Current of the National Women's Soccer League and the Australia women ...

for five years at the North West Sydney Koalas, and played on an Australian under-19 schoolgirl team which toured Britain and Ireland in 2012. In the

2012–13 W-League The 2012–13 W-League season was the fifth season of the W-League, the Australian national women's football (soccer) competition. The season consisted of twelve matchdays followed by a finals series. This season saw the addition of a new tea ...

season, Durack played for

expansion team An expansion team is a new team in a sports league, usually from a city that has not hosted a team in that league before, formed with the intention of satisfying the demand for a local team from a population in a new area. Sporting leagues also ...

Western Sydney Wanderers. She was back-up goalkeeper to

Þóra Björg Helgadóttir Þóra Björg Helgadóttir (born 5 May 1981), commonly Anglicised as Thora Helgadottir, is an Icelandic footballer who played as a goalkeeper. Trained at university level in the United States, she formerly played for four seasons with Duke Uni ...

Everton

When Durack travelled to England to train with the England women's national under-19 football team in early 2013, the Football Association found her a place at Everton, where she understudied experienced but injury-prone veteran

Rachel Brown Rachel Brown (born 2 July 1980) is an English former football goalkeeper who played for Liverpool from 1995 to 1998 and Everton from 2003 until 2014. A product of the American college system, Brown spent five years playing varsity soccer for ...

Notts County

In June 2016 Durack joined Notts County. The Lady Pies were in the market for a goalkeeper after their first choice

Carly Telford Carly Mitchell Telford (born 7 July 1987) is an English footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for San Diego Wave and the England national team. Club career Telford joined Leeds United Ladies in 2007 from relegated club Sunderland. In May of t ...

suffered torn ankle ligaments a few days previously. A month later, she was deemed ineligible due to

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...

rules.

Return to Everton

After graduating from Harvard Durack re-signed for Everton in July 2017.

Chelsea

On 8 June 2018, Durack signed for Chelsea. She announced her retirement from professional football in 2019.

International career

Durack attended the

New South Wales Institute of Sport The New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS) is a high performance sports training institute located in New South Wales, Australia. The New South Wales government agency provides world leading coaching, performance support and daily training ...

and was a member of the

Australia women's national under-17 soccer team The Australian women's national under-17 soccer team represents Australia in international women's under-17 soccer. The team is controlled by the governing body for soccer in Australia, Football Federation Australia (FFA), which is currently a ...

, before the coach rejected her as not good enough for international level. Later the English

Football Association The Football Association (also known as The FA) is the governing body of association football in England and the Crown Dependencies of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. Formed in 1863, it is the oldest football association in the world an ...

e-mailed Harvard University asking for details of any players who were eligible for their women's national teams. As Durack's mother was born and raised in

Doncaster Doncaster (, ) is a city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, it is the administrative centre of the larger City of Doncaster. It is the second largest settlement in South Yorkshire after Sheffield. Doncaster is situated in ...

, her name was put forward and she was invited to try out for the England women's national under-19 football team. She was named as one of ten "emerging talents" by

UEFA Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs f ...

after helping England reach the final of the

2013 UEFA Women's Under-19 Championship The UEFA Women's U-19 Championship 2013 Final Tournament was held in Wales between 19 and 31 August 2013. Players born after 1 January 1994 were eligible to participate in this competition. It was the first time Wales played in the final tourname ...

. At the

2014 Cyprus Cup The 2014 Cyprus Women's Cup was the seventh edition of the Cyprus Women's Cup, an invitational women's football tournament held annually in Cyprus. It took place between 5–12 March 2014. France won the final over defending champions England. Fo ...

, England's senior national team coach

Mark Sampson Mark Geraint Sampson (born 18 October 1982) is a Welsh football coach who was most recently a first team coach at Stevenage. He has also been a manager of the England women's team. Playing career Born and raised in Creigiau, a suburb of Cardi ...

gave Durack her first cap in a six-minute substitute appearance in a 3–0 win over

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

. Later that year she played in all three of England under-20's matches at the

2014 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup The 2014 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup was an international association football tournament and the world championship for women's national teams under the age of 20, presented by Grant Connell, organized by the sport's world governing body FIFA. ...

in Canada. In June 2016, Durack played for the England women's national under-23 football team against the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Retirement and later life

Durack retired in September 2019 to work at

Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs () is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan, with regional headquarters in London, Warsaw, Bangalore, H ...

References

External links

* *
Lizzie Durack profile
at

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Durack, Lizzie 1994 births England women's international footballers English women's footballers England women's under-23 international footballers Australian women's soccer players Living people Harvard Crimson women's soccer players Soccer players from Sydney English people of Australian descent Everton F.C. (women) players Chelsea F.C. Women players Women's Super League players Expatriate women's soccer players in the United States Western Sydney Wanderers FC (A-League Women) players A-League Women players Australian people of English descent Women's association football goalkeepers Australian expatriate sportspeople in England