‘I’m a TikTok star after the Women’s World Cup - now I want to play on the moon’
The year is 2035. Lauren James is 33 years old and preparing for what will likely be her final Women’s World Cup with the Lionesses. She is doing so by playing football on the moon.
That is the rough prediction from a panel of scientists and engineers from the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET).
The prognosis, underpinned by a raft of evidentiary findings, excitingly comes with its very own Lunar Football Rule Book, which outlines the logistical minutiae of playing football on the Earth’s only natural satellite. Hologram referees, a football 1.5 times larger and made from a core of Next-Gen Aerogel, high-tech helmets, space suits and, famously, very little gravity.
The prospect risks sounding outrageous. But professional freestyle footballer and TikTok sensation Lia Lewis opts to indulge in the potential future, particularly in the promise of football with limited gravity.
“In freestyle football, your biggest challenge is gravity,” the 26-year-old tells Mirror Sport as part of her campaign with the IET on its annual 'Engineer a Better World' initiative, which aims to educate children on careers in science, tech and maths.
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“If you take the trick called 'around the world', which is where you go around the ball with your foot, you don’t have time to do it because the ball comes down so quickly.
“Whereas if you’re doing it on the moon, I have this idea that instead of doing an around the world, you’re doing a triple around the world. Things might actually be easier.”
Sure, she concedes, hands might have to be involved. Equipment will be different. A net-like cage surrounding the pitch is a must to avoid losing one’s football to asteroids and wormholes.
“But I think it’s all about being a challenge.”
If there is one thing that inspires Lewis most, it’s a challenge. Her 4.5 million-plus followers on TikTok and another half million on Instagram will be familiar with her penchant for conquering them–from acrobatic handstands to insouciant shoulder juggles to back-bending walkovers, all while keeping a football floating coolly around her.
But it was the promise of a life-altering challenge that brought Lewis to this lifestyle in the first place. In 2018, as Lewis was setting to graduate from a dance conservatoire, she was struck by a sudden realisation that her life was leading down a path she did not crave.
“I had been training and dancing for close to 20 years, but it only clicked when I was 21 that maybe I didn’t want this life,” she says.
“I discovered freestyle football online. Only three girls did it professionally at the time, but I was up for the challenge. I wanted to combine dance and football and make something new.
"I thought the opportunity was there. And the challenge of doing that inspired me to get me started. In the end, it was just a decision: 21-years-old, thinking the world is my oyster, that’s how it got started. And in the end it paid off.”
American soccer player Heather O'Reilly (R) and English freestyle football competitor Lia Lewis (L) during the unveiling event for the Women's World Cup Trophy, at Summit at One Vanderbilt in New York City (ANGELA WEISS/AFP)That her circuitous journey has paid off is a wild understatement. Lewis’ exemplary aptitude has seen her crowned a freestyle world champion and subsequently travel around the world with UEFA and most recently FIFA to promote freestyle football during the Women’s World Cup trophy tour and the throughout the tournament.
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That Lewis is relishing such a high-profile life is, in itself, a nod to her appetite for challenges. But while it can seem like freestyle comes effortlessly to the former dancer, Lewis underscores the long hours spent daily on YouTube trying to perfect the basics, such as dribbling, kick-ups, balancing a football on her shin.
Even now, the endless hours of practice have not abated, a sensation that could be a source of insecurity if allowed. Lewis recalls working with Lionesses and Tottenham Hotspur striker Beth England for a workshop during the Women’s World Cup this summer.
The 29-year-old accomplished a slew of difficult tricks that had taken Lewis months to perfect in a matter of minutes. “Beth [England] has a lot to offer if she decides to go freestyle.”
Freestyle footballer Lia Lewis shows off her skills (Lia Lewis)Lewis laughs cheerfully, though some years ago the response would have admittedly differed. Four months before being crowned world champion, she told Vanity Fair that her biggest professional regret was not starting free-style football earlier, a response bred from the latent insecurity she felt at her lack of football background.
“In the end, I just needed to believe in myself a little bit more because I had something different to show on stage,” Lewis says.
“Growing up as a kid, football wasn’t an option. It was only dancing. All my friends were dancers, so I can understand how I might’ve developed a passion for football if there was that opportunity but there wasn’t.
“I think the dancing background - dance and football combined - that made me win the world championships.
“But that’s the issue. There has to be more opportunities for kids to figure out what their passion is and how they can pursue it.”
Bringing freestyle football to larger audiences has turned into an unofficial raison d’etre for the TikTok phenomenon, a mission she views as not dissimilar to that of the Lionesses. While travelling Australia and New Zealand, Lewis was overwhelmed by the response from parents and kids eager to learn how to get involved with the sport.
"It’s all about inspiring kids and getting the creativity going, because I have this idea that football isn’t just about playing on the pitch and scoring goals. There’s a whole creative side to it."
Lewis says she keeps a keen eye out for new talent percolating social media, especially women. Upon her embarking into freestyle football, the pool for women’s freestylers was piffling. Now, the spectre of seeing someone like Lewis executing jaw-dropping flicks and tricks to fawning fans is not only normal but expected.
Executing these tricks and flicks in the intergalactic cosmos would certainly qualify as a next-level challenge. Lewis does not deny the perceived absurdity of moon football in just over 10 years’ time. “It’s pretty up there” are her exact words.
But no less than five years ago, a professional career in freestyle football with nearly five million followers to count would have been classified as absurd, as would a Women’s World Cup reaching over two billion people, more than double that of the 2019 edition.
“Football and freestyle football is all about pushing boundaries at the end of the day,” Lewis says. “It’s all about challenges, accepting new challenges, getting better, setting new goals.
"It’s about achieving the impossible.”
Lewis is working with the Institute of Engineering and Technology on its annual Engineer a Better World initiative and is currently promoting a competition for children ages 4-13 to design their own space suit. To find out more information about the Moon United campaign, read the Lunar Football Rule Book or to enter the competition visit: .
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