By Alexis Monteith 

In an interview with ESPN presenter Alexis Nunes last year, Jamaican striker Khadija ‘Bunny’ Shaw explained the difficulties of her early days training with Manchester City Women and trying to adapt to their positional-play style of football. Shaw revealed that on one emotionally challenging day she expressed her frustration to teammate Lucy Bronze exclaiming “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t get this!”

That was in 2021, shortly after she arrived in Manchester. Only two and a half years later last Sunday, (January 21), Shaw became Manchester City Women’s all-time record scorer in the Barclays Women’s Super League (WSL), propelled by a hat-trick against Liverpool that brought her total to 41 goals, surpassing the previous record of 39 held by former City player, Georgia Stanway. Add another one scored the following week away at Spurs and Shaw is now on 42 WSL goals. 

The words “I can’t get this” must now seem like a faint and distant echo even if they stem from a not so distant past. 

The speed at which Shaw has accomplished this feat in arguably the best women’s league in the world is nothing short of remarkable. But the numbers behind her performances at the highest level of the women’s game tell an even more extraordinary tale.

Peter Simpson, who authored a book titled ‘Manchester City Women Results and Records’, underscored the impact the Jamaican footballer has had at the club. 

“It is now 10 years since Manchester City Women was relaunched as a professional outfit, and never in that time has anybody made the kind of dramatic impact that Khadija ‘Bunny’ Shaw has,” Simpson declared. “She only joined the club two and a half seasons ago, and in just that short space of time has completely re-written the Manchester City records book.”

Simpson is an avid City fan whose connection with the club goes back to the Manchester City Ladies, which is what the side was called before it was reestablished as a professional entity in 2014.

“I actually played five-a-side football with a couple of the Man City Ladies team in the 1990s, as it just so happened that I worked alongside Sally Rustige, one of the players who worked for the same company as me,” Simpson reminisced. “I have not missed a home game since 2016 apart from Covid times when games were played behind closed doors.”

He continues to keep close tabs on the statistics of the Manchester City Women players and will be publishing an update to his book at the end of the season.

The statistician points out that Bunny Shaw achieved 41 WSL goals in just 49 games. To add a little more perspective to that, Georgia Stanway, the holder of the previous record of 39 goals, took 109 games to get there. In fairness, Stanway was not a forward and played mostly as a midfielder among other roles. But the next best WSL goal tally at Manchester City Women was from forward, Nikita Parris, who took 72 games to achieve her 37 WSL goals. 

“Bunny eclipsed the previous mark (39 by Georgia Stanway) in sensational fashion as well with back-to-back hat-tricks in the last two league games that led to her total to 41.” Simpson highlighted. “Those latest goal-scoring feats take her to an amazing total of 8 hat-tricks in all competitions for City, with the next best being just four.”

“Last season, she scored a total of 31 goals in 30 games in all competitions, which smashed the previous record out of the park, easily surpassing Nikita Parris’ record of 24 goals in the 2018/19 season,” he added. “Bunny’s 50th goal for City in all competitions came in just her 59th game, which again smashed the previous record out of sight (Nikita Parris got her 50th goal in 113 games).”

How did Shaw achieve these records after those difficult early days of adapting to Manchester City’s playing philosophy in 2021? 

Speaking on ‘The Official Man City Podcast‘, the 26-year-old footballer explained that at the end of her first season, following the advice of her Jamaican compatriot Raheem Sterling who was a prodigious goal scorer for the men’s team, she decided to review her performances to see what she could do better.

“I took the summer and I went back and watched some of the videos and I said ‘ok, I could have made that run, I could have made that pass, I could have done that,’” Shaw recounted. “And then coming into last year’s preseason, that’s what I told myself ‘ok, I’m going to focus on this stuff and you know I am going to see if I can get them to the tee, and then see where we can get from there.’”

But in encouraging her, Sterling was also quick to remind Shaw that she had already scored a lot of goals despite her teething pains–19, in fact, in her first season. 

Shaw has also been working in recent months with Manchester City goal-scoring legend and fan-favourite, Shaun Goater, who scored 103 goals for the club from 1998 to 2003. She has credited the Bermudan former player with offering her seasoned perspectives that have improved her performances on the pitch particularly when it comes to optimizing her movements in the box.

Goater was such a prolific goal-scorer for Manchester City in his day that fans famously chanted ‘feed the Goat and he will score’ at many of his matches. Today, 20 years later, Manchester City Women fans have adapted that line for Shaw.

“‘Feed the Bun and she will score’ is definitely a chant you can hear loud and proud in the stadium when Bunny scores,” affirmed Jayne Comer, branch secretary of the Manchester City Women’s Football Club Official Supporters Club. “She is a real favourite with the fans and I feel so lucky to be able to watch her week in week out.” 

Simpson also referenced the chant and produced more numbers to further justify Shaw’s acclaim from the fans.

“Bunny has scored nine goals against each of Bristol City and Everton as well as 10 against Tottenham,” he noted. “The next best by a player against a particular club is seven goals. Bunny has twice scored four goals in a game, a feat achieved just once before, and is the only City player to score hat-tricks in consecutive games.”

“She has also laid claim to the quickest City hat-trick, completing one of her hat-tricks against Tottenham in just 38 minutes,” Simpson continued. “Five of Bunny’s hat-tricks have come in the WSL which is the same total of WSL hat-tricks scored by all of the rest of the City players combined. She really has become the ‘hat-trick queen.’”

Shaw’s impact at Manchester City Women, however, is more than just numbers and extends far beyond the pitch. She is winning the hearts and minds of City fans with her performances. Media coverage of the player from the likes of ESPN, Sky Sports and English news and sports publications have increased her visibility in the women’s game.

When Manchester City Women won the derby against Manchester United at Old Trafford in December 2023, Shaw’s goal celebration, a dance move from the music video ‘Unavailable’ by Nigerian afrobeat sensation Davido, went viral on the internet and was talked about from England to Nigeria.

The publicity has also been good for Jamaican women’s football as the attention she gets in England elevates awareness of the national team.

“Bunny has given many City fans an interest in the Reggae Girlz,” Comer stated. “It is good to see her doing well for the national team. She is making a big impact and is such a huge role model for so many young girls.”

Having now reached a club record of 42 Women’s Super League goals, Shaw’s tally across all competitions stands at 64 goals from 73 games, just four goals shy of breaking Georgia Stanway’s all-time Manchester City Women scoring record of 67 goals in 186 appearances.

As a statistician keeping track of the team, these are exciting times for Simpson who emphasised, “It is very obvious even now, that Bunny will be setting records that will stand for many years to come.”