Personal information | |||
---|---|---|---|
Full name | Jasmine Henrietta Pereira | ||
Date of birth | 20 July 1996 | ||
Place of birth | Auckland, New Zealand | ||
Height | 1.68 m (5 ft 6 in) | ||
Playing position | Forward | ||
Club information | |||
Current team
|
Three Kings United | ||
National team‡ | |||
Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
2012 | New Zealand u-17 | 3 | (0) |
2014–2016 | New Zealand u-20 | 4 | (0) |
2014– | New Zealand | 10 | (0) |
‡ National team caps and goals correct as of 10:32, 16 June 2015 (UTC) |
Jasmine Henrietta Pereira (born 20 July 1996) is a New Zealand footballer who plays for Three Kings United and for New Zealand women's national football team.
Pereira is the youngest and only girl of four children of a Samoan Palagi couple, Joseph - a former rugby leaguer who played for Sydney's Wests Tigers - and Danira. She's cousin to the actors Joe and Rene Naufahu, who like uncle Joseph also played rugby. A native of West Auckland, Pereira soon grew an interest in sports, particularly WWE wrestling, which she watched and tried to imitate with her brothers, and netball, her primary sport until the age of 13. Once Avondale College made students choose one sport to focus on, and netball had a long sign-up queue due to many girls interested, Pereira opted to attend football classes instead. She was first assigned as a goalkeeper, due to her background in netball, but after her coaches saw Pereira run, she became a forward. She only finished school at the age of 18, sidelined by her football career and life incidents such as the death of her father. Pereira is studying psychology at Massey University, using a scholarship funded by the government.
Three years after enrolling on Avondale's football program, Pereira was a part of New Zealand women's national under-17 football team that competed in the 2012 FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup in Azerbaijan, playing all their three matches. With the U-17, she also was runner-up of the 2014 National Women's League.