Anna Draper discusses last season as goalkeeper for Cheltenham Town Women FC, how playing blind football with England has improved her communication skills, and her dual ambitions of playing pro football and working as an engineer in Formula One.
Watch the full chat with Anna Draper below:
Good season but we can do better
You can tell after 20 seconds of speaking to Cheltenham Town Women goalkeeper Anna Draper (no relation!) that you’re in the presence of a positive person. But while the club achieved a record high finish of eighth in the National League last season she’s clear that the team is hungry for more:
“We got eighth place, which is a good place to be. We know we can do it,” Draper told Sport and Life.
“Seeing the girls and their attitude towards it, we know that we could have had better results, we should have taken our chances.
“And I think it’s a really exciting time now. It’s another restart, another refresh.”
Combining Cheltenham Town, blind football and F1
Draper is a busy woman. She plays semi-pro for The Robins but also represents England in blind football and plays blind football for West Bromwich Albion.
Oh, and she’s also studying to be a Formula One Engineer. At Oxford Brookes University!
But in typically upbeat fashion Draper sees this high-level juggling to be a good thing with the different areas of her life complementary to each other.
The elite maths of the engineering courses has helped her in-goal calculations over angles and distances while blind football – where she is the only sighted person on the team – has dramatically developed her communication skills.
Her teammates in the fiveaside format need her to give them information in quick fire fashion. And the plain speaking and assertiveness has informed her play for Cheltenham.
“There’s so much I have to speak about and think about because I’m not just managing myself and my own positioning and my own game.
“I’m also having to direct my players where to go. If they’ve got to clear the ball, if they’ve got to cover, where they are on the pitch. But also not over talk so that they can hear the ball.
“The confidence is massive. Because if I said it in an unsure voice they’re not going to trust me.”
A sideline in the F1 fast lane
Up until 2024 Draper was dreaming of playing in the WSL with Aston Villa. She’d risen through the youth ranks and trained with legends of the women’s game like Rachel Daly, Rachel Corsie, Alisha Lehmann and England goalkeeper Hannah Hampton.
But when that chapter ended she was quick to embrace another dream – to work in Formula One – and she’s already augmented her engineering studies with firsthand race-day work experience.
“I stepped away from Villa when I was 20. I went to work in Mercedes’ high performance training as a mechanical engineer.
We were in Spa last year. You’re seeing the drivers and and it’s like ‘gosh, am I really here?’”
What is the dream job for Draper?
So what is the overarching dream? Full-time football or a career in F1? Or both?
“I think it’s both! I know football’s not going to last forever and the engineering is something I wanted to do.
“And The National League gives that really good opportunity because it’s not fully professional and you can have that full-time job and play a very high level of football as with the England blind team, as well.”
The pursuit of being a pro
Draper’s energy is impressive. And she seems to be moving forward with great gusto on several fronts. But she hasn’t given up on being a full-time footballer.
“I definitely want to go professional. Like being in that full-time environment with Villa, I’d love to be able to go back to that.”
Aiming high next season
Of course, if Cheltenham Town women were to secure promotion to WSL 2 the club would enter a professional league.
That might be a way off given the club’s resources, but Draper is confident the 2026/27 season will bring progression.
“We’ve got backing from the club and it should be a really exciting time next season.
“We know how we felt last season, eighth is the highest the club’s been and it wasn’t good enough. Let’s go put on a better performance for our fans and the people who invest in us and our sponsors.
“Let’s do one better. We can strive for that top half finish.”
Busy but embracing it
That’s Draper ambitions for Cheltenham. Of course, as we’ve learnt that’s only part of her busy schedule. But rather than be daunted by a packed diary, Draper is embracing her varied life.
“It’s just making the most of it. Because I almost feel like the Cheshire Cat. I’m so fortunate to have these opportunities and I want to make the most of them.”
