Julie Nelson headed her name into the history books on Thursday night as Northern Ireland kicked off their Euro 2022 campaign. Kenny Shiels' side fell to a 4-1 defeat to Norway in their Group A opener at St Mary's Stadium.
It was a comfortable night for the classy Norwegians who were 3-0 up at the break. But Northern Ireland put in a valiant and proud display in what is their first appearance at a major tournament.
Veteran defender Nelson scored Northern Ireland's goal, heading home Rachel Furness' cross. As if that wasn't enough, Nelson also became the oldest ever scorer at a women's Euro finals at 37 years and 33 days.
Read more: Ipswich Town teen Cameron Stewart on new contract, loan prospects and future dreams
Nelson joked that probably not a lot of people would have expected her to get the historic goal.
She said: "I feel absolutely incredible. I absolutely didn't think I would get on the scoresheet.
"I haven't scored in a couple of years, so to score the first goal for Northern Ireland at a major championships is brilliant."
Reflecting on the 4-1 defeat, Nelson believes Northern Ireland can glean plenty of positives from the performance against one of the world's best teams.
"We knew it was going to be a difficult game. They're not 11th in the world for no reason," she added.
"We were a bit nervy the first 15 minutes and conceded a couple of goals, but I thought we stepped up after that and did our best. We can take a lot of heart from our second half performance.
"We restricted them to not very many chances and we built on the strengths we had."
READ NEXT:
- Throwback to Sean O'Neill's epic Al Pacino speech from 2018 stag
- Glentoran announce departure of first team coach Kieran Harding
- Harland and Wolff Welders announce permanent signing of Jonny Frazer
- Glentoran Football Club announce details of new feature-length documentary
Sign up to our free sports newsletter to get the latest headlines to your inbox.
