Central Coast Mariners star Taylor Ray tells aleagues.com.au how a severe ankle injury almost robbed her of a chance to play in this weekend’s Grand Final, and how the Mariners have used a critic’s pre-season prediction as inspiration to chase the club’s first-ever Ninja A-League Championship title.
Taylor Ray instantly feared the worst when she heard the snap.
Her Central Coast Mariners were up 2-1 against Canberra United in an Elimination Final, and with just two minutes left of regular time, Ray was moments away from seeing out the comeback win, and sealing a place in the Semi-Finals.
But, while falling awkwardly attempting to make a clearance, Ray felt her ankle give way.
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The Mariners transitioned the ball into their forward half, but Canberra won the ball back and launched a counterattack down the right wing, directly into the path of Ray, lying on the ground in agony.
Ray hobbled to her feet and willed herself back into battle.
Sized up by Canberra forward Maja Markovski, Ray made one last defensive effort to bump her opponent off the ball, screamed at her Mariners teammates to clear the danger and, once the ball was finally launched out of play, fell back to the ground in tears.
It could have been the beginning of the end for the Mariners’ battler. A player who, through her seven prior seasons at Sydney FC, missed two Grand Finals through injury.
Instead, it was the beginning of this season’s feel-good Finals Series story; a miraculous recovery tale that began with Ray in a moon boot, in a surgeon’s office being told she must go under the knife, only to return after two weeks to help guide the Mariners to their first-ever Ninja A-League Grand Final.
“I knew something had happened, because I heard a snap sound,” Ray recalls to aleagues.com.au.
“The adrenaline took over a bit, but I realised it was really bad. Of course, straight away there were tears, as I yelled for the physio to come on. But what I didn’t know was the ball was still in play. So I had to get back up, because I was keeping everyone onside.
“I hobbled up, and Canberra were on a transition. We were 2-1 up in an Elimination Final. There were only a few minutes left in the game. I was like, ‘I have to do something’. So my best thought was to get up and stop the play.
“I started hopping and Maja, she was so nice to me, she dribbled straight at me! So I could push her and we could stop the counterattack.
“Then I was like to Greta (Kraszula), ‘kick the ball out, please!’ Once that died down, it sat with me a little bit more. I wondered, ‘Is this going to be really bad? Am I going to miss the Semi-Final?’ All of those thoughts ran through my head, and the stress and anxiety kicked in. It wasn’t a nice feeling.
“I even said to Caitlan (Mariners physiotherapist Caitlan Skillicorn), ‘Can we tape it? Can I keep going? I know you guys need me and I need to finish the game’. She said, ‘Taylor, there are two minutes left, come off’. I was thinking, ‘Oh s***, what’s happening?’ I couldn’t bear weight on it, which wasn’t the best sign.”
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Ray answers the phone during a gym session on the Wednesday morning of Grand Final week.
As she heads out the doors of the facility, she turns to the staff and assures them she’ll be back for more after she gets off the phone.
Despite the serious nature of her ankle injury, Ray took less than two weeks to get herself back into the Mariners squad for their second-leg Semi-Final bout against Premiers Melbourne City, who were previously unbeaten through 24 games before a shock 1-0 win (3-2 on aggregate) to Central Coast led Ray and the Mariners to the Grand Final, where they’ll face Melbourne Victory on Sunday afternoon.
Ray played 80 minutes of that Semi-Final. She practically lived in the gym for the two weeks before the game, and is doing the very same in the days ahead of Sunday’s title decider, unwilling to let a surgeon’s initial prognosis of her ankle injury prevent her from playing in her fifth Grand Final.
“The surgeon told me I needed surgery,” Ray said.
“But clinically, I was passing all the tests. I could do calf raises, I could walk, I could do things you shouldn’t be able to do. So it was a bit of a tricky situation where it was like, ‘Well can I play? If I can get through the pain, can I strap it up and play?’
“We just needed to get the all clear from the surgeon. He said, ‘Honestly, just go for it. F****** send it. I’ll deal with this after the season’.
“I was in a moon boot until Wednesday last week, we were testing a few things, changing direction, running, passing, and I was getting through it. Em (Mariners coach Emily Husband) was in a 50/50 mindset, wondering if she should use me or not, and I said, ‘I’m confident in what I can give, you know I’m going to give you my everything out there’.”
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At just 24, Ray joined Central Coast ahead of the 2024-25 Ninja A-League season, after seven years at Sydney FC. Incredibly, in her eighth season in the league, Ray has never been a part of a team that hasn’t reached a Grand Final.
But two anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears in 2019 and 2022 forced Ray to watch from the sidelines as the Sky Blues won two of their three Championships throughout her seven years at the club.
It’s why missing a shot at the Mariners’ first-ever Grand Final was never an option for Ray, regardless of the injury prognosis.
“One day last week, I was in the gym for six hours, from doing a field session to treatment, recovery to a gym session,” Ray said.
“I genuinely have put myself through so many obstacles to get myself to the best possible way I can be. It’s been insane, but I’m going to be that disciplined person who gives it my 100%.
“From the past injuries, I know how and when to push myself. But for Grand Finals, sometimes you’ve just got to go for it. If it means I’ve got to be in the gym, on the field and doing full days to get it right, that’s something I’m going to put my time into doing.”
Sunday’s Grand Final will conclude Ray’s first season at her new club and, whether it ends in a confetti shower or the heartbreak of defeat, the young midfielder with ambitions of a Matildas recall will look back fondly at her decision to uproot her life, and the familiar surroundings at Sydney FC, to start a new challenge on the Central Coast.
“Sydney FC provided me a second home from such a young age,” Ray said.
“From signing for them at 15 and throughout those seven years with them I achieved so much. It was such a big status of a club as well with massive players throughout it.
“Learning off players like Lisa De Vanna, Caitlin Foord, Alanna Kennedy, the international players who wanted to play for Sydney FC, for my development as a young kid, that was the best thing I could possibly do.
“After winning those first couple of Championships, there was always a part of me that never wanted to leave, but I don’t think I got the gametime I deserved last season, so I started to have conversations about maybe going overseas or trying to find a new club to develop more as a player. So, while being so young, I thought that taking a leap right now would be the best thing before trying to go overseas, or wanting to get back into the Matildas squad.
“I had my agent reach out to a few clubs to see if they were interested in me, and it was so amazing to see that so many clubs were. Then Em reached out, and I think we spoke for three hours.
“In that conversation, we covered every base possible. She asked about goals, and outlined things she wanted to see me improve, and what she can bring to me – but also what I could do to make her team better. Since that conversation, I felt it was the best shift. I felt comfortable and knew it was the right decision. The gut feel is always right, so I just went for it.”
Little did she know then, that a move to the Mariners would lead to an unexpected positional shift.
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With club captain Taren King sidelined through injury, the Mariners travelled to face Perth Glory in December and, when defender Ash Irwin succumbed to a dreaded ACL tear in the first half of the Round 8 clash, Mariners coach Husband was forced to move Ray – a combative defensive midfielder – into centre-back.
“Em looked at Bianca Galic and I, and we were just tossing up what would be the best for the team, and who’s more suited to it,” Ray said. “So I raised my hand.
“That was the first time I had ever played centre-back, and we came away with the win. I didn’t feel too out of place, it was a very big thing to adjust to but I got through that.
“Em, Bianca and myself had conversations to figure out what we were thinking, whether we needed to sign another centre-back, but I think I just started to solidify my position. Jess Nash and I communicated really well, and it just started working phenomenally.
“Em said, ‘I know it’s not your position, and you can tell me if you don’t want to play there because I know I signed you as a midfielder’. I said, ‘Em, don’t stress about it. I’ll play here for the rest of the season, or whenever you need me. I want to win. I want to get this team to a Grand Final’.
“So it’s great we’ve already achieved that, and hopefully we can take it one more step this weekend.”
Ray didn’t just plug the gap in defence serviceably – she flourished. And as “the smallest centre-back in the league” – a point of pride for Ray – her impact at the back was crucial to the Mariners’ surge to the club’s first-ever Grand Final.
Her first season on the Central Coast ended with the Mariners Medal draped around her neck, awarded to the club’s best player each season.
Now, she hopes to use her Grand Final experience to make one last significant impact in her first season at the club.
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Ray’s Grand Final record reads: four played, three defeats, and one win. She’s lived the agony and elation.
Ahead of Grand Final number five, Ray knows how important her experience could be when the referee’s whistle blows for the first time at AAMI Park on Sunday.
“The amount of tears I have shed when losing a Grand Final is crazy,” Ray said.
“I think you’re always going to reflect on those moments, because it creates the mindset that you can do it. You can achieve it if you put your mind to it.
“I definitely will try to use my history as guidance where I can, because emotions do run higher in finals football, it can go any way so it’s knowing how you can deal with that the best way.
“Just thinking about doing it with a different club is so exciting, because I’m already so proud of how far this bunch of girls has come. To go one more step would be that cherry on top, and with everyone’s efforts this season, the amount of adaptations we’ve had to do and the changes we’ve had, we’ve had a lot of ups and downs and struggles, so if we were able to lift this one it would be very special.
“For everyone that overlooked us and didn’t expect us to get this far into the season, we’ve taken that on the chin and have had the mentality of, ‘You know what? We do deserve to be here’. We have the Mariners spirit in us because we have so many people who support us. It gives us the opportunity to show that now on the field.
“I’ve got to be really careful about what I say – but we do know someone pretty high up that has said that, and let’s just say Em before every game plays those words to get it in our heads that they don’t believe in us.
“Regardless of what people have said and their perspective on this team and not being able to make it, proving people wrong is a really nice feeling. This could be another opportunity to go the entire way, because we have the belief in ourselves to get the job done.
“Nobody likes to be told what they can and cannot do, it changes and shifts your mentality. It’s made us more connected as a team.
“This is an exciting time, and no matter how many Grand Finals you’ve been in, it always seems like it’s your first. For some of the girls to be in the context of this weekend, I’m so stoked for them to have that feeling, the excitement and what finals football brings about.”
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