LEGACY: Why Lionesses legend Kelly Smith's iconic Women's World Cup celebration didn't go down well with everyone

Before 2007, Smith had already made a name for herself as one of the best players in the women’s game. The forward spent time in the United States, first at college and then in the country's first professional women's soccer league, the Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA). Those experiences exposed her to an elite level of the game while also exposing those at the top to Smith.

Mia Hamm described her as a "different class", while former U.S. women’s national team head coach April Heinrichs asserted that Smith would've easily played for the four-time world champions if she had been eligible. But the England star had never had the opportunity to showcase that talent on the biggest stage because the Lionesses had not qualified for the World Cup since 1995.

Ending that period of absence would be a tough task, for both England and Smith. The Lionesses finished bottom of their group in qualifying for the 1999 tournament before their bid to make it in 2003 suffered a far crueller ending.

England progressed all the way to Europe’s World Cup play-off, thanks to a dramatic win over Iceland in Birmingham, but a 2-0 aggregate defeat to France would crush their dream. Smith, though, didn’t play in either of those play-offs as they came at the start of what was an incredibly difficult period for her.

In 2002, she missed significant time due to an ACL tear, and an injury to the same knee would limit her ability to get on the field in 2003. The following year, further bad luck would arrive in the form of a leg break, and it was during that recovery that Smith realised she had another problem.

“I was drinking quite heavily to numb everything,” she told the Independent. “I didn't know back then that alcohol was a depressant and I was already depressed about my injury. So I'd drink every day until I passed out, vodka usually, and usually on my own, and every time I got another injury it would spiral more out of control.”

More challenges would come Smith’s way when WUSA folded, forcing her to return to England and its less competitive domestic league, one she helped Arsenal to dominate. But she would talk to Hope Powell, the Lionesses boss, when she landed back home about her off-field issues and thus begin her rehab process at Sporting Chance, the addiction clinic set up by fellow former England and Arsenal star Tony Adams.

“I was more comfortable at Sporting Chance because there were other athletes there and I could speak about my injuries,” she said. “Nobody knew for a long time afterwards. Now, I'm not embarrassed to talk about it. If I can help other female athletes, that's good."

Injury woes would soon subside, paving the way for Smith to play a major role in England’s bid to qualify for the 2007 Women’s World Cup.

“I was so determined, so driven, so hungry to play in that World Cup,” she said in an interview for 'The Making of the Women’s World Cup', a book written by Kieran Theivam and Jeff Kassouf. “For me, the World Cup is the best and biggest tournament in the world. I’d obviously come off the back of a number of injuries and I’d had my struggles to get back to full fitness. But I felt fit and I wanted to help the team.”

And help she did. Scorer of nine goals in eight games, including a hat-trick against the Netherlands which led to Dutch head coach Vera Pauw declaring her the best player in the world, Smith's excellence helped the Lionesses top their qualifying group. Then, in the final game, an immense defensive effort from Powell's well-drilled team secured a point in France and punched the ticket to China. England were going back to the Women’s World Cup.

When Smith finally got on that stage, she made sure it was memorable. With England trailing Japan 1-0 in their opener, the forward levelled things up late on with a goal which led to one of the women’s game’s most iconic celebrations.

“I remember laying on my bed the night before the game and doing visualisation. I imagined myself scoring in this game against Japan and in this vision, I took my boot off and went to show the crowd. So that's what I did with the first goal,” she told INDIVISA. “But I was so overcome with emotion, I actually ran with it and started kissing it. That wasn't in the visualisation!”

It became an iconic image in England, long before women’s football had hit the mainstream, and one which earned Smith a booking for one of the country’s biggest chat shows, 'Friday Night with Jonathan Ross', and thrust her into the sports sections of the national newspapers.

Not all of the reception was positive. Some write-ups claimed the celebration showed arrogance, and Powell, the England manager, wasn’t happy either.

“Hope sat me aside after and told me: ‘Don’t ever do that again. You’re already a target because of the player that you are’,” Smith recalled for The Making of the Women’s World Cup. But Smith wanted to celebrate if she scored on the biggest stage, she wanted to do something fun, and the arduous journey she had endured to get there played its part, too.

“I can see now, many years later, how that might look,” she admitted. “But I don’t care because no one knew my history in the build-up to that dream. Two knee surgeries, broken leg, Achilles tear - I had a lot of time out of the game and being deep and down and depressed with football. So for me to get myself out of that, in tip-top shape and play in a World Cup, that is all part of my journey and people didn’t know about that, so I don’t care if they thought it was arrogant.”

It proved to be an historic summer for the Lionesses. A draw against holders Germany came next, before a 6-1 thumping of Argentina, in which Smith scored twice more, secured a place in the quarter-finals. Defeat to the U.S. would come, but that doesn’t take away from what England achieved.

The Lionesses have not failed to qualify for a World Cup since. It might be 2015 that delivered the watershed moment, as Mark Sampson’s side finished third, and 2023 was the best yet, as Sarina Wiegman guided the team to the final. But England’s return to the Women’s World Cup stage, for good, came in 2007, and it is Smith’s celebration that is the defining moment of that historic tournament for the Lionesses.