Olaug Tvedten

At just 11 years old, Olaug combined football training, talent-school sessions, handball and matches for several different teams — her father sometimes had to order her to take a day off because she would happily have trained every day.

Olaug regularly played for an older boys’ team alongside her brother Tarje and later described the faster pace and tougher challenges as the best thing that could have happened to her development. 

At 17, Olaug described herself as dutiful, humble and happy — two years later, she replaced that answer with a much more revealing description: “an extremely bad loser.”

Away from football, Olaug enjoys listening to her vinyl-record collection, while her biggest idol is Beyoncé, whom she simply calls “The Queen.”

At the age of 11, her two biggest football dreams were already clear — representing Norway and one day playing for Manchester United.