Nelly Las: Chelsea’s teenage summer signing out to be ‘better than’ Lionesses icon Lucy Bronze

Las, whose full surname is actually Lasova, has Slovakian roots, with her and both of her brothers fluent in the language. In 2006, a year before she and her twin, Noel, were born, her mother, Paula, moved to England from Slovakia with her eldest son, Tobias, and it is in the Leicester area that all three children grew up, all obsessed with football.

Las would kick a ball around with Noel while Tobias played football, until she joined her own team at the age of five. That was Beaumont Park, where she would play with the boys until she eventually joined Leicester at the age of 13. The Foxes had actually come knocking three years prior, leading to Las spending a season at the club, but her mother, whom she describes as the biggest influence on her career for her support and sacrifice, believed her daughter’s development would be better served at Beaumont Park at that time, so she soon returned there.

In the years between her two stints with Leicester, Las was turning over more and more stones in her quest to become a professional footballer. Joining a gym, lifting weights and doing one-to-one sessions with different coaches, the versatile wide player has a relentless athleticism that has become a key feature of her game, alongside her excellent technical qualities.

That helped her to establish herself as a regular in Leicester’s Under-21s at the age of 15 and has been crucial in her rise through the England pathway, with Las making the decision to represent the country of her birth on the international stage. She was part of the Young Lionesses’ side that reached the final of the U17 Euros in 2024 and the semi-finals of the U17 World Cup later in the year, and she has since represented the U19s, including at last year’s Euros, and the U20s, who have a World Cup coming up later this year.