“That was so fun to relive!” Sam Mewis exclaimed with a smile that spanned ear to ear after she was quizzed on her one and only season in blue.
But sometimes it’s the smallest of tenures that can mean the most to City fans and that definitely rings true for the former United States international who announced her retirement from professional football in 2024 following a long-term knee injury.
Mewis joined Gareth Taylor’s squad on 10 August 2020 from NWSL side North Carolina Courage, an opportunity she almost couldn’t believe because of how “globally recognised” City is. Nevertheless, it is one she said she will always be thankful for.
“At the time it was in the middle of the [COVID-19] pandemic,” began Mewis. “And so I knew that I wanted to find an opportunity to play in more games during a year where there wasn’t a lot of football going on in various parts of the world, and when my agent told me that City was interested, I was kind of like ‘what do you mean?! Man City wants me to come play there?’.
“And there was never any other team I was going to consider going to, as soon as I knew Man City were interested it was the easiest yes because I just think the Club is so globally recognised and has such an incredible reputation and I was even more blown away when I actually got here and saw the facilities.
“There were just so may pros to coming here and looking back I didn’t even realise the opportunities when I had it.”
“So ‘why City’ the simple answer is that it was the best opportunity I could have ever thought of.”
“So ‘why City’ the simple answer is that it was the best opportunity I could have ever thought of.”
A debut of highs and lows awaited Mewis as she was thrown straight into the thick of the action at Wembley Stadium during City’s Community Shield clash with Chelsea on 29 August 2020.
Mewis came on as a 68th-minute substitute to replace Caroline Weir but, in the space of just six minutes prior to the change, City had been reduced to 10 players and Millie Bright had given Chelsea the lead.
An Erin Cuthbert strike on 91 minutes sealed the shield for Emma Hayes’ side. A far from ideal debut, Mewis couldn’t help but giggle when she reflected on her first time representing City.
“Oh yeah I did so bad!” Mewis joked.
“It was just surreal. It was at Wembley, we were losing. I think Jill Scott had just got a red card and I was subbed on and then I just remember I kept booting the ball out of bounds.
“After the game - I think it was Keira Walsh – she had thought I was good before that and then she saw my performance and was kind of like ‘what happened?’. It was kind of funny! I wish I could have helped the team more but it was not a great start.
“But playing at Wembley was amazing. I don’t even think that in the first time I played there I realised the occasion and so I’m almost glad that I got a second chance to play there again in the FA Cup final.”
The 2019 World Cup champion, however, was given no time to dwell on the game at Wembley, because then came Mewis’ Barclays Women’s Super League bow.
A 2-0 win over Aston Villa, courtesy of a Georgia Stanway brace, topped off an impressive full debut for the then 28-year-old who seemed unfazed by the high quality and different style English football had to offer compared to the NWSL.
Mewis would go on to make a total of 32 appearances in all competitions for City alongside players she almost couldn’t believe were her team-mates.
“We had such great players, midfielders specifically, that I always felt I was learning in training and was always so impressed and I feel like I never once stole the ball back from Keira Walsh or Caz [Caroline] Weir which was so frustrating in training but it was so incredible to then take to the field with them,” said Mewis.
“I think it’s just really cool to have played with Keira, Lucy [Bronze], Georgia [Stanway], Jill [Scott], Ellen [White], and Steph [Houghton] too.
“So many legendary England players were here at the same time and it was really special to experience that.
“I do think the English game was a little bit different to what I was used to and I was really thankful that I had a foundation of technical ability from where I had grown up and the teams that I had played for before because you could never survive on the City team if you didn’t have a good foundation of technique.
“Compared to the States, it was more about our offensive shape and we had to break teams down with patience and really accurate passing and moving,” Mewis continued.
“I think I had such incredible service so I would score goals off of crosses from Chloe [Kelly] and Hempo [Lauren Hemp] and I felt like it was the best that I’ve ever played, which is so cool to kind of be able to pinpoint that moment where things came together for me.
“Everybody enabled me to perform at my best and I do like to credit Gaz [Gareth Taylor] a lot because he worked so hard with the group and I just felt really comfortable here with the girls and I felt really valued.
“And so when I look back on my career now, my experience here was so incredible because I just think there were moments that I felt like I was playing the best that I could and that’s a pretty rare feeling to have, everything coming together all at once.”
“And so when I look back on my career now, my experience here was so incredible because I just think there were moments that I felt like I was playing the best that I could and that’s a pretty rare feeling to have, everything coming together all at once.”
And like the midfielder mentioned, she wasn’t shy of scoring a goal too, which highlighted another layer to her incredible game. Mewis scored 16 goals, seven in the WSL, four in the FA Cup and five in the Champions League.
And arguably one of her most iconic in Blue was at Wembley.
The 2019/20 FA Cup final was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Rescheduled for the new campaign, on 1 November 2020 in an empty Wembley Stadium, City beat Everton 3-1 in extra-time.
Mewis broke the deadlock in the 40th minute to put City ahead. The towering midfielder, the tallest in the Everton box as Alex Greenwood swung in the corner, wriggled away from her defender and nodded the ball home with ease.
“I think it has to be!”, exclaimed Mewis when asked if it was her favourite moment in a City shirt.
“When you reflect on your career, the Championships [silverware] come up first, your first memories and most important moments. And so scoring at Wembley in an FA Cup final is just one of those things that’s cool to know that you did and were a part of.
“It was early in my time here. It was the pandemic and everything was really weird and I didn’t understand the dynamics of everything yet. And I don’t think I even understood this was an FA Cup final and we were playing at Wembley and it was super important because in America it is so far away so I don’t think we understood all the context behind the prestigious competition.
“But looking back now, I just think it was so incredible. I remember so distinctly Alex Greenwood crossed it to me off a corner and I saw the ball coming in and I think sometimes when you score things seem to slow down and so I almost knew it was going to go in before it went off my head.
“So I’ve got very vivid memories of it and I loved it. It was really cool.”
The Women’s FA Cup wasn’t the only competition Mewis learnt to love and gained a newfound appreciation for how important it is in Europe.
During her tenure at City, Mewis got her first and only experience of Champions League football.
City entered the competition at the Round of 32 stage. Mewis scored the second in our 2-1 away win at Goteborg before a 3-0 win on home soil sent City through to the Last 16 in style.
Next was Fiorentina at the Joie Stadium and it was clear Mewis was enjoying football on the European stage. She scored the third of City’s 3-0 win before a 5-0 triumph in the reverse fixture which included a fantastic brace.
City then faced one of the best teams in Europe, Barcelona, and a 3-0 defeat in Spain left Taylor’s side with a lot of work to do.
With a 2-1 win in the second leg – courtesy of goals from Janine Beckie and Mewis – City overcame the eventual winners but the aggregate scored ended 4-2. But the result took City's opponents by surprise.
Taylor's side were the first team to score more than one goal against Barcelona in 38 matches, thanks to Mewis' spot kick. The Spanish champions had also gone 11 games without conceding.
Despite our departure from the competition, it was a stint Mewis is extremely proud of.
“When I look back on my whole career, I’m so glad I got to play in the Champions League when I did because my career did get cut a little bit short and now I have no other chances to do it," began Mewis.
“Even though we didn’t win or go as far as I think that we hoped we would, Barcelona was such an incredible team, we got to travel to Italy before that and Sweden before that and just getting to play in the Champions League and score some goals, it was something not as a young American player I dreamed of but as you grow into the game and you learn more about football globally.
“I think it becomes like ‘oh wow, that’s something that we [American players] could do’ and if we go to a top club in Europe, we get to do that.
“So it was incredible and even though I wish we had won, I’m really grateful looking back now that I got to be a part of it.”
The Club’s 12-game winning run in the WSL, a record at the time, put pressure on Emma Hayes’ Chelsea and a meeting of the two titans on matchday 20 of 22 arguably decided who would win the title.
City were in need of a win but were denied by an almost unbelievable number of ridiculous saves by Ann-Katrin Berger. A 2-2 draw meant the title was Chelsea's.
“I think that’s something so unique to this league compared to where I had been before,” said Mewis when reflecting on the closure of her one and only season with the Club.
“I think in the NWSL, at least now, it’s been a few years since I’ve been playing, but it used to just feel like you’d get points wherever along the road and it never really would come down to one game or two teams that could win the league.
“So I think it was new to me at the time and that game had been circled on the calendar for so long. Chelsea’s such a great club and they’ve had so much success so it was definitely a tough match-up.
“But again, when I think back on my time here I’m just like wow, we really did have such a special group and I would give anything to have had more time together.”
The season ended with Chelsea as champions, City close behind in second, but it was a campaign to be proud of for Mewis who was named in the PFA Team of the Season.
The midfielder would go on to re-join North Carolina Courage before she was traded to Kansas City Current. A handful of appearances at both proved to be her final club games after a serious knee injury and multiple surgeries kept her out of the sport.
On 19 January 2024, Mewis made the decision to retire from football. But the 31-year-old could only reflect positively when asked for her final thoughts on what her time at City and in Manchester meant to her.
“I think distinctly I’d say two things,” said Mewis. “One is just I had this realisation of a better connection to the global game.
“I think when you play your whole career in America, you don’t understand what the Champions League means to Europe and what the FA Cup means to England.
“And I think that coming here gave me a better perspective on the game and what is so important to English fans and English players, it’s more like a religion here than it is in America. And I’m so grateful that I got to experience that first hand.
“And then as far as my own career, I just never really played better.
“And so when I think back and realising my career got cut short, I’m so grateful that I came here and performed the way I did because it proved to myself that I was good and capable of belonging here and belonging on the national team.
“So it feels really good to look back on my time in England considering I’m still sad that I can’t play anymore so having fond memories and having silverware and having come and done this at a time when I could have just not played games at all [because of the pandemic], it’s just really special.
“My time here meant so much to me.”
Written by Holly Percival
“My time here meant so much to me.”
Written by Holly Percival
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