Desert Island Discs

Original version

BBC Radio 4 LW

Discussion & Talk

Podcasts

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Factual: Life Stories

Castaway guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

Eight tracks, a book and a luxury: what would you take to a desert island? Guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

BBC Radio 4 FM

Desert Island Discs: Dame Sue Campbell, Director Women's Football at the FA

Dame Sue Campbell, Director Women's Football at the FA

BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, Dame Sue Campbell, Director Women's Football at the FA

Dame Sue Campbell shares the soundtrack of her life with Lauren Laverne.

Dame Sue Campbell, Director of Women's Football at the FA, shares the eight tracks she would want to take with her if cast away on a desert island. With Lauren Laverne.

Dame Sue Campbell is the Director of Women’s Football at the Football Association.  The women’s game has become increasingly popular recently and last year the England team - the Lionesses - made it to the World Cup semi-finals.

Born in 1948, just outside Nottingham, Sue was sporty from an early age, even changing schools to allow her to play football. She became a PE teacher in Manchester and realised how transformative sport could be, increasing self-esteem, motivation and self-belief. 

In the mid-1980s, after learning about excellence in sport at Loughborough University and playing netball for England as well as dabbling in the pentathlon, Sue became deputy chief executive (and a year later chief executive) of the National Coaching Foundation, which provided education for coaches at both ends of the spectrum, from parent volunteers to elite coaches.

Ten years later, in 1995, she co-founded the Youth Sport Trust to set up a sports activity programme for every primary school in the country.  It was hugely successful:  in 2003 only 23% of school children were getting two hours of PE a week. By 2008, this figure had risen to 95%. In 2010, the coalition government cut their funding.

By this time, back at the elite end of the sporting spectrum, Sue was also in charge of UK Sport, where she presided over Team GB's biggest Olympic medal haul in living memory, at the London 2012 games. In 2016, she took her current job as head of Women’s Football at the FA. She has also been a cross-bench peer in the House of Lords since 2008.

BOOK CHOICE: The Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela
LUXURY ITEM: A photo album  
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Music Of My Heart by Gloria Estefan And *N SYNC

Presenter:  Lauren Laverne
Producer:  Cathy Drysdale

BBC Radio 4

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Desert Island Discs

Dame Sue Campbell, Director Women's Football at the FA

Genres

Brand

BBC Radio 4 LW

About BBC Radio 4