Kettering coffee shop welcomes England football team as Lionesses roar into town

A Kettering cafe provided whistle-stop roadside refreshments to the England women's football team en route to their training headquarters.

The crème de la crème of the country's female football talent dropped into Kettering's Kafe Bloc for coffee and cake in their journey of two halves.

Football fan and owner of Kafe Bloc Tony Bagshaw opened especially to serve the two coach loads of customers and staff members pitched-in to produce the orders.

Despite usually being closed on a Monday, the cafe team welcomed the players and backroom team to the Sheep Street shop on February 21.

Tony said: "I got a phone call saying were we open on Monday - I said no and they said there's 40 of us so I said yes. Then they said that they were the England football team."

Over-the-moon Tony, a Sheffield Wednesday fan, had the team's orders were pre-arranged with flat whites the most popular beverage of the day.

He also brought in freshly-baked banana cake, that was still warm, for the players and coaching staff.

A spokesman for the team said: "Kettering is the halfway point between where we were to where we are going. The group are big coffee lovers and we need exclusivity (because of Covid protocols)."

The team were travelling from Norwich where they had drawn 0-0 with Spain in the Arnold Clark Cup - a warm-up for the World Cup qualifiers.

England legend Jill Scott, who has 153 caps for England, owns her own coffee shop Boxx2Boxx coffee in Manchester with her partner.

She said: "It's lovely coffee - it's just what we needed to take away the Spain pain.

"It's the first time I've been to Kettering and it's very picturesque."

Kafe Bloc owner Tony is no stranger to serving football royalty with Kettering-born Premiership manager Sean Dyche a recent customer.

Tony said: "I'm so pleased that they sought out an independent shop. Loads of the team said that they really enjoyed the coffee."

Last night England beat Germany 3-1 at Wolverhampton's Molineux Stadium thanks to two late goals.