Anna Vincenti – Football, Skiing, Boxing and Healing

To say Anna Vincenti’s story is unique just does not do it justice. As a goalkeeper, she has played for several top Scottish sides. Anna was also a Team GB freestyle skier and amateur boxer. Now retired after a horrendous list of serious injuries, Vincenti is using her experience to treat others as an acupuncturist. Albeit one who was always afraid of needles!  

Skiing when I was three

It was difficult to know where to start interviewing someone who had participated in three different sports. As you might imagine, Anna was sporty from a very young age.

“I started skiing when I was three. My family all ski so skiing was kind of always a thing for me. Then with football, I started at I think seven or eight for the boy’s football club at my school. Back then women’s football was not big at all. My coach used to tell me to run about and I was like ‘what position I meant to be’ and he just said ‘it doesn’t matter, just run about the pitch.’

So that is where football and skiing started. There is an age where they say if a kid does as many sports as they can when they are young, the easier it is to pick up things in life because those brain pathways have been made. I think because my mum just put me into all these sports, it was quite easy for me to just pick up random things throughout my life.”

Adrenaline buzz

As she reached her teens, Anna was forced to decide which sport she was going to prioritise. Despite her enjoyment for football, and in particular goalkeeping, it was the adrenaline buzz of skiing that won out.

“The reason why I became a keeper was because my next-door neighbour was a striker. He just used to put me in goals and pelt balls at me and just expect me to try and stop them. I had to just learn to save them so that is where the goalkeeping came about.

I think it was because the culture in skiing is amazing that I chose it. You can be up at the top of the slope and turn to someone behind you and say ‘I’m about to try a new trick, can you give me a bit of time.’ Everyone would be supportive and random people would cheer you on, it is just such a nice culture.

I am quite an adrenaline junkie, so I like to go off jumps and get the adrenaline that way. I just started falling in love with skiing more than I did football so I do not regret choosing it. Even with all the injuries, I am so happy that I took that path.”

World Cup

Vincenti reached a high level at a young age, participating in World Cup level skiing whilst still in her teens. However, her progress was hampered as she suffered her first serious injury.

“I did my first World Cup when I was about 18 years old. That was in New Zealand and I came eighth, so that was really good. I did reach quite high level, but unfortunately, I was just back-to-back injured the whole time. I would come back and then I would just pick up another injury and I would be out again. They were not small injuries, you know, they were surgery requiring injuries. So yeah, they were pretty bad ones.

I have done my ACL twice, meniscus and then my AC joint and my shoulder, I got that reconstructed because I snapped all three ligaments that were holding that down.”

Constant injuries

The constant injuries finally took their toll and Vincenti was forced to step away from competitive skiing.

“I loved skiing so much and I was just so passionate about it. Every time that I went through a rehab yeah, it was hard, and it sucked to be honest. I was at home in Scotland seeing everyone else skiing in New Zealand, Australia, America and Canada, whilst I was just sat at home. Obviously, it is hard but at the same time, I just loved it every time I got back on the skis. It felt like it was worth all that rehab. That is what kept me going, just the love for the sport.

The reason I retired was because I just got to a point where I was too scared. I was looking at people going off the jumps and I just thought ‘I don’t want to do that anymore.’ Even if I go skiing now, I am thinking that just one little wrong move and my knee might go.

When I last did my ACL, I had done six months of rehab. I passed every single test by a mile and I was the strongest, the fittest I have ever been in my whole life. Then I went to New Zealand for three days and my knee just went again. Honestly, I felt like my soul left my body. I genuinely looked at my coach and I was like ‘I can’t go through that again.’

I did twelve months once again of rehab then I went away to Switzerland for six months to do my season. That was when I just thought, ‘I don’t know if I can do this.’ I just never came back.”

Back between the sticks

As the door closed on her skiing career, her love of football stepped in to fill the void. An opportunity to get back into the game came from Motherwell but it took the former Hibernian keeper longer than she expected to get back into the swing of things between the sticks.

“I went to Motherwell after skiing. When I retired, I got a message saying that they needed a keeper. So, I ended up getting in contact with them but I could not even kick the ball. I literally drove back from Switzerland on the Thursday, I think we trained on the Friday night, then on the Sunday they were playing. They asked if I could play as their keeper was unavailable and I had not even kicked a ball properly yet.

I think I had two surgeries by that point, so going back to football after skiing and after those surgeries meant I struggled to kick a ball. I think my muscle memory had totally gone. Honestly, I don’t even think the ball went out of the box the first few times.”

Sparring Alex Arthur

In addition to returning to the football pitch, Anna also found a love for boxing after leaving her skiing career behind. What started as an enjoyable way to keep fit led to Vincenti talking her way into a sparring session with former WBO World Super-Featherweight Champion, Alex Arthur.

“I’ve always wanted to box, always. My mom always said my face was too nice, so she never let me. When I played at Hibs we used to go down to a boxing gym. We used it for fitness but me and one of my friends would get in trouble because we would just start punching each other.

Boxing came about when I injured my knee and I was getting interviewed about the injury. The interviewer told me she was about to talk to Alex Arthur as he was opening his own gym. I ended up training with him and I would say ‘please can we spar. Please can we spar.’  He would say ‘no, we’re not sparring.’ I kept on and on at him so one day he put his gloves on and yeah, he battered me. But it was so fun.

From there, I started having fights. I always like to do things that scare me and I just think the adrenaline that you get from it is unreal. When I was younger, I used to watch it and I always wanted to try it. When I started with Alex, I just fell in love with it. It is such a hard sport, they say that ‘you don’t play boxing.’ When I was a boxer, my cardio was the best that it has ever been. I was in the best shape I have ever been. I loved how hard it was. When you go in the ring, I describe it like you are getting into a cage with a lion and the door is closed behind you. That is how it actually feels in there. It is the scariest feeling ever before the fight but after, it feels amazing.”

Celtic

Anna’s burgeoning boxing career did not mean she was finished with football. She vowed to stop playing after a difficult spell with Partick Thistle until she was persuaded back into the game by a move to Celtic.

“Partick came along when I was boxing. They needed a keeper for the rest of the season. I thought I would just do it until the season finished but I had not played football in about two years. I had been boxing which is obviously completely different but I was even standing on the pitch like a boxer. You know how a boxer stands more side-on, well that is how I was stood in goal, everything was off.

Going between sports is fine, but you need the training to train your brain as much as anything. I literally felt in every game like I was going into an exam that I had not studied for. Honestly, I hated every moment of it so I thought at that point, I am not a footballer anymore. I swore I would never play again. Then Celtic then called me up.”

No regret

“It literally took them three attempts for me to agree to do it. But I do not regret it as it was the one of the best experiences to play for a massive club like Celtic. To train like a professional was all I dreamed of when I was younger. It is funny because I always thought growing up that I wanted to be a footballer. Then I ended up being a professional skier, but I don’t remember me ever saying I wanted to be a pro skier. It was always that I wanted to go to America and play football. So, it felt like I was doing it for my younger self, going play for Celtic. To experience what professional women’s football is like was amazing and I do not regret it at all, even though I got injured again.”

Moving on

Yet another serious knee injury, suffered in a game for Celtic against Glasgow City, would finally bring the curtain down on Anna’s unconventional football career. It was a career with lots of stops and starts and it also included playing international football for Malta, the country of her Grandfather’s birth. Now Vincenti is using her lived experiences with injury to help others in her role as an acupuncturist. Not a role you expect for someone who is afraid of needles.

“When I retired from skiing, I wanted to go and be a psychologist. It interested me so much how the body follows the mind. It just fascinated me. Every time I got injured, my brain would just follow my body in a sense that it would not break down, but it would be impacted and your mood would change. I wanted to do that and I told my uncle who is an arthropathic doctor over in Canada and he advised me to do Chinese medicine.”

It is my calling

“At that time, I hated needles. I had fainted every time I saw a needle. The fact that I am doing this now is funny. There is no way I could have thought I would have a business doing it but I have fallen in love with it. I genuinely feel like it is my calling. I just understood the body because I have always been around surgeons talking about ‘this ligament’ and ‘that ligament’ and showing scans so I understood everything.

My sister says that she thinks that I want to be somebody that I technically never had, if that makes sense. I am basically treating my inner self through treating other people, I just love helping people get better. I think in the world we live in, why not just try and make as many people as you can better, healthier, or happier. That is honestly my aim, just to help as many people as possible. I would eventually like to open a community clinic where I can treat people for a reasonable amount of money. Because acupuncture is amazing. It can help so many people.”

Desire to help people

Anna’s love of her new occupation is as clear as her desire to help people. For now, her sporting career is behind her. She is still able to enjoy ski trips with friends despite her injury problems. She will not return to competitive skiing but does admit another sport might lure her back out of retirement.

“I like to meet up with the other girls that were on the team, we just like to go for a ski together randomly.  One of my clients is having a boxing match, so I am sparring her to help her train for it. I love the sport so I am getting my fix. I mean there is a fight night coming up later in the year. My mum is not listening so, yeah, I might have a think about that nearer the time.” 

You can find out more about Anna’s work at the website – https://www.advancedhealingarts.co.uk