Inside Crystal Palace’s season: how newcomers are stepping up to WSL
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The Palace manager Laura Kaminski and midfielder Chloe Arthur discuss the step up from the Championship and what they need to do to show they belong. Laura Kaminski’s alarm rings at 5am every day, with the aim of her being as prepared as possible for training with forensic detail. She is clearly a “morning person” and exchanges a knowing look with Crystal Palace’s women’s team press officer when she hints that her “battery starts to run out at four o’clock”. Yet, as the clock ticks towards that time and she sits down for this interview, suddenly she has a new lease of energy, because she is discussing a topic that invigorates her: her parents.
![[Tom Garry]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/uploads/2024/06/19/Tom_Garry.png?width=75&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
“I owe everything I am to my parents. I was brought up with very good values and morals, with a mother who encouraged constant interpersonal skills, encouraging me to talk to different people, to play, to join in. Those traits in my personality that my parents encouraged [mean] my interactions with other people is probably one of my strongest points as a manager,” she says. “I spent a long time as an assistant coach, so I listened to a lot of moans and groans in groups because assistant coaches often get the conversations that head coaches don’t. I appreciate the players’ thoughts, their reflections, their honesty. Those connections, for me, are vital.”.
![[Crystal Palace players celebrate going 1-0 up against West Ham in a game they lost 5-2.]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/0aac1c481ff9c1e4f6c26612ddcd80db16614dfd/0_156_2700_1620/master/2700.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
Kaminski grew up in Bedford as an only child, and was inspired by her chain-smoking former grassroots youth-team coach Andy – “a great guy, loved by the players, as he was so encouraging” – to turn her love for football into a coaching career. When she completed her Uefa B licence coaching qualification, as a 20-year-old, she was the only woman among 84 candidates on the assessment day at the David Beckham Academy. “I was so ambitious, young and hungry, it didn’t deter me. I actually relished that I was different, because I stood out. But I know that feeling for others might be uncomfortable. Female managers fight every day for that ‘odd one out’ feeling to go away, and as I grow, a wider ambition of mine is to really encourage the next generation to come through.”.
![[Chloe Arthur has top-flight experience from spells with Bristol City, Birmingham and Aston Villa.]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/852c35d50819648f06ccce95e8d7a391705e082c/0_0_7581_4816/master/7581.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
