A TikTok creator who goes by Nicola and posts under the handle @nicolaeick said in a video that an England football player messaged her on social media in 2019, then unadded her after learning she is 6 feet tall. Nicola said the player had called her height “unladylike” before cutting off contact.
Nicola, who said she now works for FIFA, did not name the player in her video. She said she recognized him years later when he played a match in Dallas and scored a goal.
According to Nicola, the exchange began when the player slid into her DMs, and the two spent a couple of weeks messaging back and forth. She said he later added her on Snapchat, and the two began texting regularly.
Player allegedly called Nicola’s height ‘unladylike’ after asking how tall she was
Nicola said the conversation shifted after she posted a picture of herself with a friend while getting ready for a night out. She said the player responded to the photo and told her she looked “pretty tall,” then asked how tall she was.
Nicola said she believed her height would work in her favor, since she said she is a former Division I athlete. She said she thought about how her athletic background might make her more appealing to the player rather than less.
Nicola said the player responded to her height with a single word: “Oh.” When she said she followed up with several question marks, she said he wrote back that “6 feet is just too tall” for him and that it was “pretty unladylike.”
Nicola said she took time before replying, noting that she had faced comments about her height since elementary school. She said that before she could respond, she noticed the player had removed her from his contacts, which she said was indicated by an “X” next to his name.
Nicola said in her video that seven years had passed since the exchange. She said she now works for FIFA and that the player, who she said plays for England, scored a goal during a match in Dallas that she said she attended.
Nicola said she was happy for the player’s performance in the match. She added, however, that she believed his listed height was inaccurate, saying he appeared to her to be “a solid 5’7″” rather than 6 feet, which she said was the height listed in some records.
Nicola said that online searches turned up multiple different listed heights for the player, which she said included five separate figures. She suggested this inconsistency may explain why he reacted the way he did to her own height.
Nicola closed her video by saying she hoped the player’s team would win the World Cup.
The video drew significant attention in the comments section, where users debated the exchange Nicola described. One commenter named Christine asked why men in similar situations seem insecure, drawing a reply from a user named Peter, who suggested a man who is 5’7″ might be unlikely to date a woman who is 6 feet tall. Similar appearance-based judgments have also been reported in social settings with professional athletes, like a Miami woman’s story about NFL players.
Christine responded by saying the comment illustrated projection, adding that she is 5’10” and has previously dated men shorter than herself. A user replied simply, “Yes,” to Christine’s comment. In a separate comment thread, a user who described herself as 5’2″ told Nicola she wished she were 6 feet tall and called her “gorgeous.” A user replied that, at 5’11”, she does not feel the same way, saying she has struggled to find pants in regular stores that do not come up short at the ankle.
Another user responded that she has to hem her own pants because they come too long, adding that “tall women are very striking.” Another viewer replied that people who are shorter do not have the option to add length to their pants the way taller people can hem theirs. Other dating interactions have also sparked online debate over specific behaviors, such as a man taking home expensive leftovers.
Nicola has not publicly named the player in the video.
