It comes as little surprise that Guro Reiten has been a success at Gotham FC.
Prior to joining the Bats, the Norwegian winger played a key role in delivering 13 trophies in a six-and-a-half-year spell at Chelsea, where she was twice named to Women’s Super League PFA Team of the Year.
The 32-year-old is beginning to feel comfortable with the adjustments that come with playing in the NWSL after spending her entire club career on the other side of the Atlantic.
“I feel like I’m slowly starting to settle in where we live with my family and stuff like that,” Reiten said during Friday’s press conference. “[It’s been] hectic, busy, fun. I always say that I play football because of the people, because they mean the most to me. I’ve loved getting to know my team, the staff and everyone around this club. So it is nice. It’s been very, very fun.”
NWSL Travel Presents a New Challenge for Reiten
Perhaps the biggest change has been acclimating to the travel demands of playing in the United States, especially as WSL away trips were within a few hundred miles of London.
“I’ve spoken a little bit about this before, but I knew moving over here that America’s a big country,” she said. “There’s a lot of travel, a lot of away games with long flights, but not in my wildest dream did I think it was like this. I’ve been a little bit tired, not going to lie, but I’ve had good communication with our medical team focusing on food, drink, hydration, all of those things that I can impact before traveling and during travel.
“It’s slowly getting better. But at the same time, my body just needs to do it enough times so that it knows what it’s going to do. It’s definitely impacted me. I’ve been more tired this season than I’ve been in a long time and it’s mostly because of the travel.”
Reiten Makes History With First Gotham FC Goal
Reiten made history by becoming the first Norwegian to score in an NWSL match in Gotham’s most recent outing, a 2-1 road victory over Racing Louisville on September 11. She opened her Gotham account with a long-range effort from outside the box that curled into the top-left corner.
“I should have scored a few goals already,” she admitted. “I’m not happy about that. But finally I got one. I want to give the assist to Jess [Carter] because I was gonna cross it, but then I heard Jess from behind screaming to shoot, and I did, and it went in, and she came up laughing because she was like, ‘I know you were going to cross that one.’ It was a nice moment and hopefully I can get some more.”
Through her first 19 NWSL matches, the 5-foot-5 forward-turned-outside-back has scored one goal and provided four assists. Gotham FC head coach Juan Carlos Amorós believes that her impact has changed the equation for the defending NWSL champions by fueling the Bats’ left-sided attack.
Amorós: Reiten Has Been ‘Outstanding’ for Gotham
“I’ve told her this — I think since Guro joined us, the dynamic changed,” Amorós said ahead of Saturday’s match. “I think she’s giving us another dimension on the ball on the left hand side. I think that really helps us to progress, to be even more offensive on that side. She’s created a lot of situations that really helped the team in that way.”
Reiten initially switched to left-back while Lilly Reale was injured and has played the majority of her minutes at outside back after Reale was traded to Boston Legacy FC on June 17.
“Obviously, we’ve asked her to probably do a different role than what she’s used to,” Amorós said. “She’s embraced it. I think she’s been outstanding on her defending, contributing to obviously the best defense in the league with so many clean sheets, and her professionalism. She’s always giving 200 percent in whatever we ask of her and I can only thank her because I think it’s definitely a change from the moment she joined.”
Reiten Balancing Football and Family Life in NYC
There hasn’t been much time for Reiten to slow down. When she does have time to relax, it’s often inside Manhattan coffee shops while exploring the city with her partner Julie Nilssen and son Felix.
On the pitch, she is known for dragging defenders out of position with her exquisite one-on-one dribbling; off the pitch, it’s young Felix who drags her around New York City.
“We have a 10-month-old son — he’s the boss,” she said. “He decides what we can and cannot do. But to bring him into Times Square for the first time, that was hilarious. You guys love your coffee shops, and I feel like we’ve started going to coffee shops every day as well. I feel like that is a New York thing to go to coffee shops. It’s been almost like our highlight of the day. So we love different coffee shops in the area.”
Reiten and Gotham FC Chase After a Treble
Similar to her Chelsea days, Reiten is thriving in a big city. She’s already helped deliver Gotham’s first-ever NWSL Challenge Cup in June, and with six regular-season matches left, the first-place Bats could go on to complete a historic treble by winning their first NWSL Shield and delivering a second straight NWSL championship title.
“This season so far has been great,” Reiten stated. “We are exactly where we want to be. But we know going into the last few months that this is, I like to call it, ‘the trophy season’ because this is where everything is going to be determined on who’s actually going to win the trophy.
“We really want to win both [the NWSL Shield and championship], but we know it takes a lot of hard work, and we are willing to put in the work to get there. There are a lot of good teams and a lot of good players in this league. So we just got to buckle up because I think it’s going to be a ride.”
Reiten and Gotham will conclude a three-match road trip on Saturday against the North Carolina Courage. The 6:30 p.m. Eastern Time match at First Horizon Stadium will be broadcast on ION.
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