The Replay #2
Videos, headlines, interviews, or news articles worth pausing on — shared or retold with added context, insight, and intention.
In this second edition of Forward Press, we highlight an informative episode from the Femme Football Collective Podcast. Femme FC is an education and community platform dedicated to advancing health, performance, and professional development in women’s football. It connects research to real-world practice for medical and performance staff in elite settings through resources such as this podcast.
Founded and hosted by Nicole Surdyka, DPT, CSCS, CPSS, an experienced physical therapist and sport scientist, this Arizona-based podcast has been produced weekly since its launch in October 2025, bringing together leading practitioners to share expertise, practical strategies, and perspectives shaping high-performance environments across the women’s game.
In this episode, Nicole’s conversation with Lorena Sumser, Lead Physical Performance Coach of Rangers Women FC, explores the challenges of working across different performance systems, the opportunities for collaboration between club and national teams, and how culture shapes the physical preparation of female footballers. Lorena also reflects on Women’s World Cup experiences, OL’s Champions League standards, and her approach to player readiness in the Scottish Women’s Premier League (SWPL).
This discussion offers practical insights for anyone navigating cultural change and working within elite environments with differing demands and expectations, building on our previous conversation with Dr David McHugh of Washington Spirit, in the first edition of Forward Press.
Video courtesy of Femme FC Podcast | YouTube
Femme FC Podcast | Apple Podcasts
Lessons from Building a Career through Cross-Cultural Club and National Team Environments
1) Career progression requires cultural adaptability, not just technical expertise
Lorena’s work across Germany, France, and Scotland showed that technical knowledge alone is not enough to work successfully in different women’s football environments. While the core principles of performance training stay the same, practitioners must adapt how they work depending on the culture and environment.
Professionals must be able to:
Adapt communication styles to different cultures and hierarchies
Understand varying levels of professionalism across leagues
Adjust expectations around staff roles, decision-making, and player relationships
Integrate into new environments quickly while building trust
In women’s football specifically, environments can differ widely in structure, resources, and maturity of professional systems, so we must be flexible.
Your ability to read environments, adapt behaviour, and fit within different performance cultures is a key factor in career progression.
2) Effective practice in women’s football depends on strong club-country collaboration
Lorena’s experience with the German youth national teams highlighted the importance of strong communication and collaboration between national teams and clubs. Players are mainly developed in their club environments, so national team staff must work together with clubs rather than independently.
For practitioners working across different environments:
Players belong primarily to club systems
Training and performance approaches must align across organisations
Physical development and load management should be shared responsibilities
Lorena described several practical strategies that supported this collaboration, including:
Building relationships early with club staff
Using clear two-way communication
Sharing performance data and feedback quickly after camps
Respecting existing club programmes while supporting individual player needs
Having a collaborative approach is particularly important in women’s football, where staffing structures and resources may vary significantly between organisations. Practitioners must position themselves as collaborators and system connectors.
3) Leadership in elite women’s football requires balancing high standards with empathy and boundaries.
Across environments, Lorena found that successful practitioners:
Maintain simple but high-quality performance principles (strength, speed, resilience)
Show genuine care for players
Build strong relationships with players while setting clear professional boundaries
Adapt their leadership style depending on the culture and team environment
Women’s football environments often involve:
Ongoing growth and rapid professionalisation
Changing staff structures
Diverse player backgrounds and training histories
Emotional intelligence is required alongside technical expertise.
Progression into leadership roles depends on managing people, culture, and expectations, to complement delivering high-quality performance programmes.
If the key takeaways we outlined on the Femme FC Podcast resonated with you, we’d love to hear your thoughts.
Tap the ❤️ below, share your own reflections in the comments, or contact our Head of Talent & Partnerships at francesca@formationgoals.com with your suggestions.
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