The Big Interview: Eartha Cumings
The Scotland goalkeeper has fought back from the brink of losing her career. Now, she's FC Rosengård's record-breaking number one and reflects on her journey ahead of crunch Euro 2025 play-offs...
As we speak, Eartha Cumings isn’t quite in full international mode just yet, but very much will be by the time our half an hour chat goes out, now just 24 hours until the first of two crunch Euro 2025 qualifiers with Finland, with the winners sealing a place in next summer’s showpiece tournament in Switzerland.
But as we speak early in November, Cumings is sat on a bench in a cold Swedish train station, not far from where she now calls home.
The 25-year-old has just completed her first full season with Damallsvenskan giants FC Rosengård, a season which included winning every single game bar one, her playing every single minute, conceding just nine goals, and the team winning a dominant title, Cumings’ first major trophy of her career.
It’s a special feeling for the goalkeeper for many reasons, and to understand why, you have to channel back to her past and the various trials and tribulations she’s been through to get to this moment.
“This once felt a long, long way away,” Cumings admits, staring off into the distance of the night sky. “This year has been so…I can’t emphasise how amazing it has been in every way. It’s hard to appreciate these things when you’re in them, you think it will go on forever, don’t you?
“It’s so nice to turn up and see the girls every day. When you win every week there are no slumps, we just kept going and going and going and to win my first ever title was so special.”
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Why? Because when she was a teenager, Cumings developed compartment syndrome during a routine operation, meaning there was insufficient blood supply to the issue in her legs, and at one point amputation of both legs was a distinct possibility.
In a previous interview with The Telegraph, Cumings described how she cried at her surgeon through the pain not to do it, knowing it would not just be life-changing, it would end a prospective football career before it barely begun.
Since then, she’s moved to England to play for Bristol City, become Charlton Athletic’s first professional player, earned a move to one of the biggest names in English football in Liverpool, moved abroad for the first time and won her first senior caps between the sticks for Scotland.
Speaking about her decision to move abroad, it’s clear there was some trepidation, but perhaps how close she came to losing her career has made her take a more ‘what’s to lose?’ approach to her pathway.
“Maybe. I don’t really sit down and think about it, but maybe it has. Like you say, what’s the worst that can happen? If you feel you’re not happy in a situation or place, you’ve got to change it. There’s no point sitting somewhere and being miserable for however long.”
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