One-on-One
One-on-one: Danni Farmer
Published by Gillingham Ladies Media on October 22, 2009
The first in a new series of exclusive interviews with the Gills squad, we catch up with midfield playmaker Danni Farmer, who tells us how she’s enjoying life at the Gills, how she spends her time when she’s not playing and shares her hopes for the future.
How have you settled in at Gillingham after your move from Charlton?
I have settled in really well and am really enjoying my football again. The girls are great and made me feel welcome straight away.
Tell us a bit about the camaraderie within the squad. What’s training like?
I love a bit of banter and there is certainly loads of it at Gillingham, especially in training. There is a bit of a battle at the moment between me and Les Kay as to who has got the best jokes. I’m winning though!
Training is really good. Thursdays are a bit more serious and are concentrated on getting us prepared for the weekend but Tuesdays we do six-a-side tournaments, which can get really competitive. Some players do try to cheat, though, mentioning no names…Terri!
You’ve played Premier League football while with Charlton. Based on your time at Gillingham so far, how far does the current team need to progress to get to that level?
Obviously a lot of the players I played with at Charlton had played at the top level of women’s football and had a great deal of experience which comes with time really.
I think we are heading the right direction; we are doing well at the moment and are looking to get promoted so it’s important that we continue progressing slowly and make sure we don’t get ahead of ourselves.
Tell us a bit about what you do outside of football – job, weekends, hobbies, interests etc.
Outside of football my time is taken up by work really. I am a PE teacher at New Line Learning Academy during the day. Some of the older lads ask me about how we got on at the weekend but most of them aren’t really interested! Then after school I coach for a company called Soccer Elite FA.
Other than that I like to shop a lot and chill out with friends. I’m obsessed with X-Factor. John and Edward to win!
You got a good win on Sunday at Cambridge. How did you feel the match went?
I think we did enough to win the game. I was not really a performance to remember but we still managed to score five and win comfortably without getting out of second gear.
You’ve got Lewes coming up at the weekend. Tell us a bit about them, and how you’ll be preparing, both as a team and as an individual?
Well obviously they are the only team to take points off us this season. We gave away two avoidable goals early on last time and then struggled to score throughout the rest of the game even though we dominated throughout.
That result really hurt us so we will be looking to make amends on Sunday. Personally I’ll just be focussing on getting in a good performance and hopefully winning the game.
What are your hopes and expectations for this season and beyond?
Our short term goal is to get promoted. That is what has been set as a target for us and we are doing well so far, so we need to keep winning and picking up points.
If this season’s target of promotion is achieved I feel that there’s no reason why we can’t continue and become a well established team in the Southern Premier League and beyond that possibly get promoted to the FA Women’s Premier League.