This season really hasn’t gone to plan for Grace Clinton. After enjoying a breakout season while on loan at Tottenham to earn her first England caps, then backing that up with a brilliant campaign back with parent club Manchester United, the young midfielder was sent to Manchester City in the summer, with Park moving the other way. While Park has thrived since the move and stood out as one of the most in-form attackers in Europe, Clinton has struggled to even get on the pitch for large parts.
Some of that has been down to injury. The 22-year-old had a niggle when she arrived on the blue side of Manchester and so that slowed her start with the club, then a knock in October kept her out of England’s first games post-Euro 2025. But she’s been fit since then and still struggled to break into City’s league-leading side, making just two starts in the Women’s Super League this season.
It’s now having a knock-on effect with the Lionesses. Though called up for the 25-player camp this month, Clinton was left out of the 23-player matchday squad against Ukraine on Tuesday and then didn’t get any minutes against Iceland on Saturday, with Wiegman noting her lack of game time when speaking with the media before the latter fixture.
“She can’t really control it. What she can control is her own development and taking responsibility for her development, and that’s what she’s doing,” Wiegman said. “She’s working really hard and we have these conversations because, of course, for me, she’s in a part of her journey where she really needs the minutes.
“She’s responded really well. We also had that conversation last camp, because at that point she came back from injury and didn’t get that many minutes. We have conversations all the time and so far she has responded really well because she wants to improve and she wants to show what she can do, of course.”
It’s not an easy position for Clinton to be in, especially with City’s number of games limited this year due to a lack of European football, and competition for her place in the England squad particularly high.
The good news is that this isn’t a major tournament year, meaning there’s not going to be some hugely devastating impact of that lack of game time right now. It’s very plausible that the picture is entirely different next season, when City have a fuller calendar and Clinton has more chances to state her case.
But it is frustrating, and this talented young player is missing out on minutes at a vital point in her career, something she’ll hope she can make up for in due course.
