'It's a fair cop' - Hibs Women star planning for future

Abbie Ferguson is enjoying life since summer switch to Hibs.

With Poppy Lawson playing mum and a cleaner coming in to tidy up regularly, the house share arrangement involving five Hibs Women first-teamers hardly sounds like a remake of some raucous comedy. Animal House, it isn’t.

Which is probably just as well, for Abbie Ferguson. Not only because loud music might induce a few painful flashback symptoms for a player just recovered from concussion. But because it wouldn’t look great for a future officer of the law to be the subject of police complaints about noisy parties.

The young winger, a summer signing from Celtic, is considering studying criminology as a way of preparing for a life after football that, all going well, would see her swap the green-and-white of Hibs for a Police Scotland uniform. As much as she’s enjoyed the short working hours of a full-time footballer, the Scotland youth international needs an outside diversion.

“I want to get into studying,” said Ferguson. “But I need to pick a subject. Honestly, I have so much free time. I will get up in the morning and have almost nothing to do until training.

“So in the summer I’ll look at university, doing something with my time. I’ve looked into criminology. Me and Poppy were talking about doing the course together, so we have a bit of help, can study together.

“I think I want to be in the police after football. So I thought I may as well fill my time doing something that can help me in the future.”

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Ferguson, who spent last season on loan at Partick Thistle, admits she’s still adapting to her summer move to Hibs, revealing: “It’s my first time moving out of home. I’m only from Perth, so it’s not like I’ve moved too far away, just an hour or so.

“I’m living with a few team-mates, which is nice. I’m staying with Mya (Christie), Tegan (Bowie), Comfort (Erhabor) and Poppy Lawson. We have a place in Leith. We can literally see the stadium. And obviously it’s handy for Meadowbank.

“Poppy is the mum! To be fair, we have a cleaner … a lot of the girls make fun of us about that. But the girls are good, and at least the house is always clean. It’s quite a good group. Not a lot of parties!”

Ferguson is available for today’s visit of her old Partick pals to Meadowbank, having suffered a concussion in last month’s 3-1 home loss to Celtic. With the subject back in the news at the moment, thanks to Martin Boyle’s sickening head knock last weekend, her tale of a slow and often painful recovery makes for interesting reading.

Explaining the one-step-forward, two-steps-back progress she endured after suffering a seemingly trivial head knock, she said: “I wasn’t knocked out or anything, so it wasn’t a bad one. But I’ve had quite a few setbacks since I started.

“I actually had really sore eyes, that was the biggest one. I couldn’t really look at light. Noise, as well. And headaches. But I wasn’t sick, it was just my eyes whenever I watched TV or looked at my phone. So I had to stay off my phone …

“It was so annoying. I would be fine for maybe two days, then I would come in here and the bright lights, the loud noises in the gym, it would be another setback. And it was getting frustrating. Thankfully I’m over the other side of it.

“It was a bit tough, really, coming back after four weeks of doing nothing. I’m not going to lie!

“I had come back on the pitch to do some running, then my head was hurting when I was moving it. So I had to take another break.

“When those symptoms settled, I went back to running and it felt a lot better. So I’ve been in training this week, did Wednesday non-contact which was fine. Well, I say fine … it was definitely tough after so long out! On Friday I was back in full contact training. So I was pleased with that.

“It’s quite an intense schedule after the split. But the girls like that because you train to play. So having a game three times a week, sometimes, is when you need everyone in the squad to really be at it.”