Beth Mead, born in May 1995, is a professional English football player who currently plays as a forward for Arsenal in the Women’s Super League (WSL) and also for the English national team. Reading Beth Mead biography, we see that she is known for her creativity and high goal-scoring ability, which has earned her the record for the all-time most assists and second-most goal contributions in the WSL.
In the UEFA Women’s Euro 2022, she played a crucial role in leading England to their first major tournament win by being the Golden Boot winner, Player of the Tournament, and top assist provider.
This achievement also earned her the prestigious BBC Sports Personality of the Year award in the same year, making her the first women’s footballer to receive the honor. Mead was also a runner-up for the Ballon d’Or and UEFA Player of the Year award.
Back in 2015, at the young age of 20, she became the youngest WSL Golden Boot winner and also won the WSL Player of the Year award.
This was after leading her former club, Sunderland, to the promotion and the WSL 2 title win. With an impressive record of scoring 77 goals in 78 games, Mead is widely regarded as one of the best players ever to have played for Sunderland.
Everything About Beth Mead
To start off, let’s have a look at Beth Mead stats in 2023.
- Beth Mead Real Name: Bethany Jane Mead
- Beth Mead Age: 27 years old
- Beth Mead Height: 5 ft 4 in (1.63 m)
- Beth Mead Nationality: English
- Beth Mead Current Team: Arsenal, England national team
- Beth Mead Position: Forward
- Beth Mead 2022/2023 Women’s Champions League Minutes Played: 148
- Beth Mead 2022/2023 Women’s Champions League Goals: 2
Her Personal Affairs
According to Beth Mead biography, the professional footballer has been involved in two high-profile relationships with her Arsenal teammates. She was previously in a romantic relationship with Danielle van de Donk, and she is currently dating Vivianne Miedema.
In addition, Mead is close friends with another former Arsenal teammate, Jordan Nobbs. Mead has admired Nobbs since they were both involved in the Middlesbrough Centre of Excellence, and they share a similar career path, having played for Sunderland before moving on to Arsenal. In fact, Mead has joked that she followed in Nobbs’ footsteps.
Beth Mead Club Career
She was in love with football at a very young age, and so we are going to begin our article since she was very little.
The Only Girl Playing Football
According to Beth Mead biography, she spent her childhood in Hinderwell, a small village near Whitby. She described it as a “fishing town in the middle of nowhere” with a population of around 2,000.
Mead’s love for football began at the age of six when her mother took her to a local Saturday morning football session, which was run by a volunteer coach. Despite being the only girl among the boys, Mead loved playing football and would often play on the community field, regardless of the animals or the length of the grass.
Mead was interested in many sports, such as netball, cross-country running, cricket, and field hockey.
However, football was her true passion. She found playing on the pitch to be her escape from the world, and she loved the feeling of kicking the ball. When she was older, Mead joined her local senior cricket team for a day and was so good that the local newspaper called it “The Mead Show.”
During her time at Oakridge Community Primary School in Hinderwell, there was no girls’ football team, so Mead played on the boys’ team.
She was the only girl but became the captain of the team. As she continued to play, more girls joined in, and they eventually won the local primary school cup for boys’ teams, with four girls in the team.
Just Getting Started
Mead’s youth career began at the age of nine when she played for both California Boys FC and Middlesbrough center of excellence. Her mother had to take on a second job to afford the petrol costs required for the twice-weekly 45-minute drive to Middlesbrough academy, where Mead was playing.
Despite facing discrimination from other players and parents when playing for California Boys FC, Mead’s father encouraged her to let her football skills speak for themselves, an interesting fact regarding Beth Mead’s family. Mead’s talent as a striker was evident at a young age, and she scored a hat-trick against Sunderland, one of England’s top teams, in just a few minutes when she was 13 or 14 years old.
Beth Mead biography says that Sunderland’s manager at the time was so impressed by her abilities that he met with her and her parents when she turned 16 to sign her up for the team.
Joining Sunderland
In her first season playing in the FA Women’s Premier League (WPL) in 2011-2012, Beth Mead scored 23 goals in 23 games and helped Sunderland win the league and the FA Women’s Premier League Cup.
She also won several awards, including the WPL Golden Boot, Sunderland Player of the Year, and the Mavis Clayton Memorial Trophy for Outstanding Achievement.
The following season, she scored 30 goals in 28 matches and won the WPL Golden Boot and Sunderland Player of the year awards again. She also won the Top Female Achiever award at the Scarborough and District Sports Awards.
In the 2014 season, Mead helped Sunderland win the WSL 2 title and was the top scorer for the team. She was nominated for the WSL 2 Player of the Year award and won several other awards, including SportsByte Sports Person of the Year and Sunderland Supporters’ Young Player of the Year.
We can see in Beth Mead biography that despite turning professional, Mead decided to finish her final year at Teesside University and also worked at a local pub.
Mead continued to excel at the top level and scored several important goals, including a hat-trick against Chelsea, and ended the 2015 season as the leading goalscorer in the WSL, winning the WSL Golden Boot, WSL Player’s Player of the Year, PFA Young Player of the Year, and several other awards. She also became the youngest WSL Golden Boot winner ever.
Mead is widely regarded as one of the best players to have played for Sunderland, having scored 77 goals in 78 games for the team.
Life at Arsenal since 2017
In Beth Mead biography, On January 24, 2017, it was announced that Mead had signed a full-time deal with Arsenal, although the length of the contract was undisclosed. Mead had previously turned down several offers from Arsenal since 2015 so that she could complete her university degree in Sports Development.
In 2018, Mead was named England Young Player of the Year for the second time, as well as Football Supporters’ Association (FSA) Player of the Year and Arsenal Women Supporters Club Player of the Season. She was also selected for the PFA Team of the Year.
During the 2018-19 season, Mead reinvented herself as a versatile winger under Joe Montemurro and broke the WSL record for the most assists in a season (12).
Mead topped various creative statistics in the league that season, including the highest assists per 90, most carries into the penalty area, highest xG assisted, most crosses into the penalty area, and most shot-creating actions. She also finished with the second-most key passes, passes into the penalty area, and goal-creating actions.
Mead scored the third goal in Arsenal’s 4-0 title-clinching win at Brighton & Hove Albion on April 28, 2019, and this goal won the WSL Goal of the Season award.
Staying with the Gunners
Beth Mead extended her contract with Arsenal in November 2019. In February 2020, she sustained a medial collateral ligament injury, ending the 2019-20 WSL season prematurely. Mead played in the UEFA Women’s Champions League quarter-final, where she scored a goal against Paris Saint-Germain on August 28, 2020.
During the 2020-21 season, Mead had the second-most assists in the WSL and was ranked in several other statistics. The 2021-22 season was a successful one for Mead, as she became the all-time assists leader in the WSL and established herself as a key player in Arsenal’s pressing and counter-pressing system, one of the interesting facts included in Beth Mead biography.
She was named the FSA Player of the Year and won several other awards. Mead’s total goal contributions in the season were 33. Arsenal finished second in the WSL and advanced to the knockout stage in the UEFA Women’s Champions League.
Appreciating Life
After her successful campaign in the UEFA Women’s Euro 2022 in October 2022, Mead attributed her acclaimed performance to her mother’s terminal ovarian cancer diagnosis in the summer of 2021. She stated that her mother’s illness made her realize the value of life and not worry about trivial things.
In Beth Mead biography, it is noticed that Mead’s motivation was to make her mother happy and proud, and she spent the entire year trying to put a smile on her face.
On September 16, 2022, she became second in WSL all-time goal contributions with 54 goals and 39 assists, totaling 93 contributions. She was named PFA Fan’s Player of the Month and Arsenal Player of the Month for September 2022 after scoring three goals and assisting two in two games.
On October 19, 2022, Mead was named Player of the Match in Arsenal’s historic 5-1 win over the Champions League holders Lyon, scoring two goals and assisting one. It was the first time Lyon had conceded five goals since May 2005, and they had not lost by more than a single goal in the Champions League since 2009. This defeat was only their second in 83 home games.
Serious Injury
Mead sustained a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury in a league game on November 19, 2022, which required her to take several months off from playing. She urged for more research to be conducted into ACL injuries in women’s football, as she was among the 25% of 2022 Ballon d’Or nominees who were out of the game due to the injury.
Beth Mead biography states that despite the injury, she signed a new contract with Arsenal on December 16, 2022, expressing her love for the club and its community. With 61 goals in 166 appearances, she has been a prolific scorer for Arsenal so far.
Mead created 64 chances in 2022, which was the second-highest number of chances created in a single calendar year in WSL history, even with her injury. She was the top scorer with eight goals in all women’s UEFA competitions for both club and country in 2022, which tied with Aitana Bonmati.
Mead was also the runner-up for the IFFHS World’s Best International Goal scorer, having scored 15 goals in international matches for club and country in 2022. She finished second in the ATA Football WSL Player of the Year 2022 competition.
If you are interested in these types of biography articles, feel free to check out Thibaut Courtois Biography as well.
Her International Career
We continue by telling you all about her time with the English national team.
Representing England from Early On
Mead has represented England in football at every age level from under-15. She was a member of the England U19 team that earned a silver medal at the 2013 UEFA Women’s Under-19 Championship. During the semi-finals, Mead scored two goals. She also won the silver ball award.
Mead participated in all three matches for the England U20 team at the 2014 FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup. She scored a goal from long range against Mexico, which was voted as the tournament’s third-best goal, an interesting fact in Beth Mead biography.
In April 2018, Mead made her debut for the senior England team as a substitute in a 0–0 draw with Wales in Southampton, a match that was part of the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup qualification campaign. She made her first start in September 2018 and scored two goals in England’s 6–0 victory over Kazakhstan in Pavlodar.
Impressive Performance with Senior Squad
Mead made a notable impression with her excellent performance during the 2019 SheBelieves Cup, where she scored two impressive goals for England. In the first game against Brazil, she scored the match-winning goal with a remarkable “crot” (cross-shot) finish that became her signature.
According to Beth Mead biography, she then scored in the team’s 3-0 victory against Japan, securing the SheBelieves title for England. Mead continued her excellent form, scoring the opening goal in England’s 2-1 win against Spain in April 2019.
During the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup in France, Mead played in the first two matches and provided an assist for Jodie Taylor’s goal in the second group stage match against Argentina. She also assisted Lucy Bronze’s goal in the quarter-final match against Norway, which England won 3-0.
Mead provided another assist for Ellen White’s equalizer in the semi-final against the United States, although England lost the match 2-1. She was shortlisted for the England Player of the Year award and named the Yorkshire Post Sports Hero of 2019.
Mead continued to perform well for England, scoring the game-winning goal against Portugal in October 2019 and creating several chances in a match against Brazil later that month. However, she was unable to play in the 2020 SheBelieves Cup due to an injury.
Her First International Hat Trick
Mead scored her first international hat trick on October 23, 2021, in a match against Northern Ireland during the 2023 World Cup qualification phase. She scored three goals within a 14-minute period in the second half of the game, leading England to a 4–0 victory.
Beth Mead biography shows us that Mead made history by becoming the first woman to score a hat-trick at Wembley for England. She repeated this feat on November 30, 2021, during a World Cup qualifier against Latvia, where she scored three goals and assisted three more as England won 20-0, their largest-ever victory.
On April 8, 2022, Mead scored four goals in England’s 10-0 win over North Macedonia in another World Cup qualifier.
In a match against the Netherlands on June 24, 2022, Mead scored two goals as a substitute during the second half of the game. Her first goal came just 54 seconds after the Dutch team missed a penalty when the match was tied at 1-1.
Her second goal helped England take the lead for the first time, and she was named England’s Player of the Match.
These goals brought her total to 14 goals in the season for England, which surpassed Jimmy Greaves’ long-standing record of the most goals scored in a single season by an England player of either gender, which was set in the 1960-61 season.
Winning More and More Awards
Mead had an outstanding performance at UEFA Women’s Euro 2022, where she helped England win the tournament and became the Player of the Tournament, the top assist provider, and won the Golden Boot with six goals and five assists in six matches.
Her goals tied the record for most goals scored in a single edition of the Women’s Euro, and she was directly involved in half of England’s goals at the tournament.
It is highlighted in Beth Mead biography that in addition to scoring and assisting the most in the tournament, Mead created the most chances, completed the most crosses, had the highest crossing accuracy among players who attempted over ten crosses, made the highest assists per 90, and won the most Player of the Match awards.
Mead opened the tournament with a goal against Austria and scored her fourth career international hat-trick against Norway, where she was named the Player of the Match. She also scored against Northern Ireland and Sweden, where she provided two assists and was named the Player of the Match for the second time.
Her performance in the tournament impressed UEFA’s Technical Observer panel, who praised her consistency, hard work, and crucial goals and assists.
A Brilliant Player
Mead had a remarkable performance at the Euro 2022, which earned her several awards, such as the BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year, World Soccer World Player of the Year, and England Player of the Year, among others. She was also a runner-up for several awards, such as the Ballon d’Or and UEFA Player of the Year.
In addition, Beth Mead life story includes the fact that she made history by being the first female footballer to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award and the first footballer to win the Sports Journalists’ Association (SJA) Sportswoman of the Year award.
On November 11, 2022, Mead reached her 50th appearance milestone for England, and she scored a total of 29 goals in various competitions, surpassing all her teammates by 12 goals. She has played in 23 games under Sarina Wiegman, contributing to 37 goals (21 goals and 16 assists), which is 13 goals more than any of her teammates.
In 2022, Mead was the leading scorer (8 goals) among all women’s UEFA competitions for club and country, which was equal to Aitana Bonmati’s record. Additionally, she ranked second in the IFFHS World’s Best Woman Player and IFFHS World’s Best International Goal scorer, with a total of 15 goals scored in international matches for her club and country.
