Ruesha Littlejohn and Lucy Quinn discuss what makes Lauren James a world class player

Republic of Ireland internationals Ruesha Littlejohn and Lucy Quinn have discussed what makes Lauren James such a special player after her stunning hat trick at the weekend.

James was in remarkable form at Stamford Bridge in the televised game against Liverpool on Saturday evening - a game which was watched a record number of viewers on BBC One - bagging a hat trick and an assist in the 5-1 victory.

Speaking on episode two of 90min's brand new bi-weekly women's football podcast Life's a Pitch, Littlejohn and Quinn talked about just how good James is, recalling how difficult they found it playing against her in the past.

Speaking about playing against James, Littlejohn said: "I'm giving the red card of the week to Lauren James purely because it's not fair, she's too good. She makes it look so easy.

"There was one game, this was a few years back, when she was at Man Utd and I was actually a Birmingham then. I remember she was dribbling and she was quite close to me and I thought 'got you', and thought I'd give her a wee nudge - nothing, she kept going. Then I thought I better give her a wee kick - she booted on again, I fell and she ran away with the ball.

"I wasn't trying to hurt her I was just trying to stop her, but she didn't stop she just kept going."

Quinn shared Littlejohn's sentiments, saying: "I've played against her before and even when I've tried to stop her I haven't even gotten close enough to kick her because of her change of pace. I'm just like 'oh, just kidding, bye, off you go'.

"That is a good red card, just pure jealousy."

"Yeah just pure jealousy because it's not fair, is it?" replied Littlejohn.

As well as dishing out the 'Red Card of the Week', in the latest episode of Life's a Pitch the pair also talked about their lives as professional footballers, with Quinn being particularly keen to flaunt her recently-received Championship Player of the Month award, and how they think they'd fair in I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!.

You can watch episode two here. The audio version is also available on Apple and Spotify podcasts.

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