From Taekwondo to £1m Transfers: Why Olivia Smith Is Women’s Football’s Most Exciting Bet

Olivia Smith is not your typical footballer. Most top players follow a straightforward path through academies and youth setups. Smith did taekwondo to cope with bullying, trained gymnastics to improve her agility, and boarded a plane to Michigan at 15 without knowing where she'd be sleeping. That kind of resilience is rare, and it matters enormously when you're trying to forecast who makes it to the very top.

For anyone watching women's football closely, Smith is one of the most exciting long-term propositions in the game. And if you're thinking about who to back for individual awards, big transfer moves or international glory over the next three to five years, she deserves serious attention.

The Making of a £1m Player

Smith became the first £1 million women's footballer when Arsenal signed her from Liverpool last year. That fee was a landmark moment for women's football and it didn't come out of nowhere. Liverpool had already paid a club record £210,000 to bring her in just one season earlier, and she repaid them by becoming the first woman to score for the club at Anfield in a Women's Super League match.

She has now won the PFA Women's Young Player of the Year award twice in a row, making her the first non-English player to take the prize. She's 22. Those numbers aren't a fluke and they aren't inflated by hype. They reflect a player who is genuinely ahead of the curve.

Her background explains a lot of it. Growing up in Whitby near Toronto, with a Jamaican father and a Chilean-Peruvian mother, Smith absorbed football culture from multiple directions. Her grandfathers both played the game at different levels. She describes having flair in her DNA, and when you watch her, you believe it. The direct running, the composure in front of goal, the way she shifts weight to create shooting angles, it all carries a certain freedom that coaches can encourage but can't manufacture.

Why Taekwondo Made Her a Better Finisher

This is where the story gets genuinely interesting from a performance standpoint. Smith credits taekwondo, which she took up as a response to being bullied at school, with directly improving her shooting speed and discipline. The mechanics make sense. Taekwondo trains explosive, precise striking with both power and accuracy. The hip rotation, the snap of the kick, the mental focus required to execute technique under pressure. These are qualities that translate directly into striking a football.

Her gymnastics background added flexibility and agility. Smith herself points to injury prevention as one of the key benefits. In a sport where women's football still lags behind men's in terms of sports science and squad depth, staying fit across a full season is a genuine competitive edge. Managers at the top level take fewer risks on players who can't stay on the pitch.

When you combine that physical foundation with the mental toughness she developed through gymnastics, taekwondo and years of moving around the world as a teenager, you get a player who is built to handle the pressure that comes with big expectations.

The Ballon d'Or Target and What It Means for Bettors

Smith wrote down in a journal as a young child that she wanted to win the Ballon d'Or and the World Cup. Most kids dream about those things. Very few operate with the same single-minded consistency that Smith has shown in getting here. When a 22-year-old who has already broken transfer records twice tells you those are still her goals, you take it seriously.

For anyone tracking women's football markets long-term, Smith is the kind of player you want in your thinking early. She's at Arsenal, a club building with genuine ambition in the WSL and in European competition. She's settled there for the first time in her career, starting her second consecutive season at the same club. Stability often triggers a step change in output.

Canada will lean on her heavily at the next World Cup cycle. Arsenal will want her at the centre of any title challenge. The individual awards market in women's football is still relatively young and the value in backing players before they reach their absolute peak is real.

Our Call

Olivia Smith is the most well-rounded young talent in women's football right now. Her athletic foundation is unusual, her mental strength has been tested in ways most players her age haven't experienced, and she's arriving at the point in her career where everything clicks. We'd back her to win at least one more major individual award before she turns 25, and her odds for future Ballon d'Or recognition are only going to shorten from here. Get in early on Smith. The diary her dad kept of every goal she scored? It's going to be a very long book.