Leeds United and Liverpool unite to help football community - Sue Smith

You can try and force it with bonding exercises – we once went to an army boot camp and maybe that helped, especially for the new players – but it often just happens naturally.

You can see team spirit on the field. You could see it with Leeds United at West Ham United last weekend.

No matter what is happening in terms of performance, results and injuries, you never hear fans saying the manager needs to go. It is a fanbase united behind head coach Marcelo Bielsa and the club.

In adversity, things can go one way or the other and you could see a real fight about them at West Ham, even after two players went off injured midway through the first half, and even after they conceded two equalisers.

I was really lucky in my career because there was not a team I did not enjoy my football at. I have never been at a club where I could not wait to leave – the opposite, in fact.

You go through a lot of ups and downs and spend a lot of time with your team-mates. Even playing semi-professionally you are training three nights a week with a game at the weekend, staying overnight for away games.

At Doncaster Rovers Belles, we got relegated before we kicked a ball in 2013-14 and wanted to prove a point. That was probably the most together squad I played for.

The next season we played Sunderland, our nearest rivals, and during the game I was taken out. As soon as I got up there were three or four team-mates around me having a go at the girl who tackled me. One of them was her England Under-23 team-mate and a good friend but she was standing up for me and for Donny.

I have team-mates I might not have spoken to for years but I could pick the phone up to them now and have a really good chat and a laugh, and it would be like we had never been away.

Recently, I commentated on one of Jess Sigsworth’s games. Jess was in that Doncaster team too.

It was the first time I had seen her in ages but I spoke to her afterwards and you do not forget those moments you shared together. She has had loads of new experiences since, but she will only have good memories of our time together at Doncaster.

That bond never really goes so if you hear about a former team-mate in trouble, you always want to help and you can be pretty confident they would do the same for you.

When the Darby Rimmer Foundation did the 100k in May for motor neurone disease last month a lot of Stephen Darby’s former team-mates at Bradford City and his other clubs took part but a lot of female players did too to support his wife, Steph Houghton.

It is not just a football thing. What Kevin Sinfield is doing for his former Leeds Rhinos team-mate Rob Burrow is unreal.

I am in a WhatsApp group with a lot of my former Leeds team-mates and it was through that our old manager Mark Hodgson told us Stacey Daniel had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. The only way she can get treatment is by raising £50,000 to go to Mexico.

He said she was not the type of person to go asking for help, so he would.

I had not spoken to Stacey for a long time, but she is one of my mates and she needed my help.

We all donated, then shared it on social media but we knew we needed to do more.

Stacey is a big Liverpool fan so we discussed some sort of challenge between Anfield and Elland Road. Over lots of Zoom calls it went from running to walking to cycling in sections with an auction afterwards, which is what we are going to do on Thursday.

Because I love a challenge, I have stupidly said I will cycle all the sections. If you are going to raise money, it has to be a challenge.

Leeds have been brilliant, organising the whole event. They wanted to look after one of their own and they have our back.

Hopefully, there will be members of the Leeds United family, even if they do not follow the women’s team, who want to rally round and help Stacey. We’re all Leeds, aren’t we?

You can find out more about Stacey’s story and donate at tinyurl.com/57932zp3.