by The thought of 10 months of grueling rehab may seem daunting, but not for Siobhan “Shiv” Wilson. This is their area. As an online fitness coach whose fitness videos have attracted a million followers on TikTok, there are few places she would rather be than the gym.
“It’s strange, because if it happened to anyone, the best person for it to happen to is me, because I love being in the gym anyway,” the Birmingham City defender says of his knee injury. “I said to myself, ‘If you want to be in the gym so much, here you go, you’re going to have to be there several times a week now’. I like to see the transformation and so, when I look back now and think that I couldn’t even squat, I couldn’t even walk, compared to where I am now, ‘I did it’. I’m finally feeling like a footballer again.”
Wilson is nearing match fitness again after recovering from her degree, but what happened to her body in the 20th minute of a home game against Southampton on April 2 last year was still brutal.
“I was dribbling the ball, I moved the ball onto my left foot and, as I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, my right knee buckled. I heard a pop and immediately knew I had done something. I thought, ‘My knee isn’t supposed to go there, it hasn’t been in that condition before’,” says the Jamaica international at Birmingham’s Wast Hills training ground.
“I did my ACL [anterior cruciate ligament]MCL [medial collateral ligament] and meniscus, so I couldn’t make it worse, to be honest. I had to have three surgeries in one: ACL reconstruction, MCL reconstruction and I had to drill my meniscus back down, because it came off the root.
“At first it was like I lost my identity a little bit, because I love being active and I love playing football, so to go from that to not being able to walk, drive or anything doing something normal for a month, your mind doesn’t know how to deal with it. Simple tasks like getting up to change, going to the toilet – it’s so sudden, sitting there unable to do anything. And you’re not involved in team stuff, so, mentally, it’s terrible.”
The 29-year-old’s hard work has been well worth it, however, as she has just signed a new contract with the Women’s Championship club.
“It’s huge. The club has a special place in my heart,” she says. “Also, you see in a lot of places, when players are nearing the end of their contract, especially with the ACL, this injury will happen and then they’ll have nothing. So, for the club to believe in me and put their trust in me by offering me a new contract, I’m so grateful.
“I love the girls and all the staff here. I’ve been at other clubs where they saw you as a player, but here they value the pitch and the pitch as well, which I love. The club allows players to be themselves and understands that there are other things we have to do outside of football.”
Wilson’s activities outside of football have sparked a third cause for celebration in recent days, after she surpassed one million followers on TikTok. It was quite a transformation for someone who worked as a postwoman alongside playing before moving to Birmingham to become a full-time footballer in 2022. After coming through the American collegiate system, Wilson played for Spanish side Malaga, Sassuolo in Italy. , Charlton Athletic and then Crystal Palace, where she was training to deliver parcels and letters.
“I didn’t mean to be an ‘influence’, what they call it. Before I played here in Birmingham, I was playing semi-pro at Crystal Palace and I was working as a postwoman for Royal Mail, so I was training four times a week, plus a game on Sunday, but I didn’t we ‘in’. for as many hours per week, so it was not classed as ‘professional’. I worked this morning and I was doing personal training plans online, so I was basically doing three jobs at the same time.
“Finally, I said, ‘Something has to give, here’, because I can’t sustain this lifestyle. I wasn’t going to quit football and I wasn’t going to quit my business, so I had to be Royal Mail, even though that was my main income at the time. I was then posting more on TikTok to get clients [for personal training] and then suddenly one video goes viral, something silly like nine million views, so I said, ‘Okay, this is a thing now, I’m going to keep doing it’. Fitness goes hand in hand with football and I was asking, ‘How can I become a better footballer by doing certain things in the gym?’, and then I became obsessed with seeing things go improving. I’m never happy. I wanted to hit a million and now it’s there I’m like ‘I want two million’.”
Wilson is also finding that her social media fame could help attract new fans to Birmingham games, adding with a laugh: “I’ve even had Villa fans comment on my TikTok and say, ‘I’m come to one of your games’. It’s so nice when people come up to me and say, ‘I love your videos, you helped me get back in the gym’.”
She will be back on the pitch soon and will be hoping to help Birmingham’s promotion push – they are locked in a five-way battle for the sole place to move up to the Women’s Super League. Birmingham are four points off leaders Charlton but have a game in hand. Plus, a million new fans.
