Ruesha Littlejohn: Irish midfielder on switching from Scotland & World Cup hopes
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Ruesha Littlejohn, right, celebrates with partner Katie McCabe as Republic of Ireland beat Scotland in a World Cup play-off last year
Ruesha Littlejohn says she has no regrets switching from Scotland to Republic of Ireland after being excluded from the national setup.
The Glasgow-born midfielder played for Scotland at youth level until she claims she was not selected due to her behaviour.
Now 32, she has amassed 68 caps for the Republic who are heading to their first Women's World Cup this summer.
"At the time we knew I was a bit of a character," she said.
"I probably did a few things to upset Anna Signeul at the time and she obviously wasn't having that.
"I think there had been a little bit of carry on to do with clubs and stuff like that. I remember then it was the start of a new season going into the under-19s and one of the coaches pulled me aside and was like: 'you're on your last warning'.
"We then went out to the training pitch and I was carrying on, lunging and stretching, and one of the coaches turned round and was just eyeballing me. Then that was it."
Littlejohn's international exile was eventually broken when Irish team-mates at Arsenal sounded her out about her grandparents' heritage, leading to a phone call to eventually join an Irish training camp.
After deliberating with family, the former Scotland under-19 cap went on to make her Republic debut against Hungary in 2012.
"I spoke to my mum about it and she was very keen because she probably considered herself more Irish than Scottish," Littlejohn told the Behind The Goals podcast. "My dad was definitely Scottish, and was probably [asking] 'do you think it's the right thing to do?'.
"When Scotland had heard, I know Anna had phoned me three times to be like: 'okay you can come back now, I think you've learned your lesson. Don't make any rash decisions', but for me it had gone on for so long. I was happy to go to Ireland and I think my life would be very different if I hadn't."
She added: "There was never any bad blood there. End of the day, that's what happened.
"Dealing with things, you were just young, stupid and naive. I'm not saying I was an angel, I definitely did a lot of things that weren't great, but I think at that time boys and guys' football accommodated guys like that because they knew you had to have different characters.
"I think the girls' side was a bit a different."
Injury prevented the Aston Villa midfielder from going up against the Scots last year when they faced off at Hampden in a seismic Women's World Cup play-off, with the visitors claiming an historic 1-0 win.
However, she is already relishing the prospect of starring on the biggest stage of all when the tournament kicks off across Australia and New Zealand in July, with the Irish in Group B with Australia, Nigeria and Canada.
"It's amazing to say you've qualified for a World Cup," she said.
"I've seen the opening game against Australia has been moved to a bigger stadium. It's good, it's exciting but my main priority is to just not get injured."