Katie Zelem never dreamed of playing for Juventus. You would need a pretty active imagination to foresee a future with a team that does not exist. She watched along with the rest of the world as the Italian club squared off against Real Madrid in the men’s Champions League final this June. But it was not until a month later that the Old Lady’s ladies’ team was born.

Although Juventus previously ran youth programmes for female players, they had never fielded a senior side. Under a scheme launched by the Italian Football Federation to encourage investment in the women’s game, they bought out the licence of an existing team, Cuneo Calcio, last summer and set about building a new squad from scratch.

Zelem, a 21-year-old midfielder born in Oldham and playing for Liverpool in the FA Women’s Super League, knew nothing of it until the day they came in with an offer. “My agent called up and said: ‘Juventus are interested,’” she recalls, eyes widening with the memory. “I just thought: ‘Wow!’

“I’d never really considered Italy, to be honest. From England to Italy is not usually a move people make in women’s football – the game in England is developing at quite a high rate at the minute – but with Juventus it’s a completely different story. In a matter of a couple of days, my contract had been finalised and I was meeting the girls at the training camp.”

Even now, she does not seem to quite believe it. “I actually spoke to one of my good friends yesterday and said: ‘I still don’t feel like I’ve moved here.’ I’m just on a little holiday.”

It is easy to blur the lines when your profession is also your passion. As the daughter of the former Macclesfield goalkeeper Alan Zelem, she grew up with a ball at her feet. Her dad’s twin brother, Peter, also played professionally and has a son who is one year older than Katie. They lived next door and would kick a ball about together in the street.

“Our whole family is so competitive,” recalls Zelem – noting how it was not just football that stoked the fire. “I remember playing tennis against my dad at maybe 11 years old and I wouldn’t win a single point. I’d be four sets to nil down and finally we’d be done.”

Advised that not everyone would have the stomach to keep going for four sets under such circumstances, she gives a little chuckle. “We would. Until I could win a point, I’d be running around the court. As I started getting older I got smarter about it and could move my dad around a bit. Now he won’t play me any more!”

That refusal to duck away from a challenge should serve Zelem well on this new adventure. When she arrived this August, she did not speak a word of Italian and had not even held detailed discussions with her new coaches about her role in the team. For her, it was enough to know that this would be a chance to see a new part of the world, to challenge herself and get better.

Katie Zelem is getting used to life in Turin although she says: ‘I still don’t feel like I’ve moved here. I’m just on a little holiday.’ Photograph: Daniele Badolato/Juventus FC via Getty Images

The one person she made a point of speaking to was her England Under-23 team‑mate Paige Williams, who returned to the Women’s Super League with Birmingham this year after two seasons in Italy. “Paige said: ‘No matter what comes out of it, you’ve had the opportunity. You’ll learn a new language, you’ll try different things.’”

Williams won a Serie A title at Brescia in 2016, and Juventus will be chasing the same target. At a minimum, the club hope to qualify for the Champions League – which requires a top-two finish. A desire to play in the latter competition was another driving factor in Zelem’s decision to make the move.

There are limits, though, to how far she will go to follow in her countrywoman’s footsteps. Williams arrived in Italy by car, piling her belongings into a Fiat 500 and driving for 17 hours. Zelem kept things simple and flew. “I had debated going back to get my car but they’re all crazy drivers over here,” she says with a laugh. “I’m not sure if I’d be able to handle it.”

It is not the only Italian stereotype to which she has found some truth. “The first week I was here I think we had pizza three times,” Zelem says. “I was like: ‘What?’ I thought it was a joke when people said that people here eat pizza and pasta all the time. But I’ve eaten pasta every day as well. In the hotel I’m living in they serve it every day.”

Living out of a hotel room gets old fast but the search for an apartment is not straightforward either when you do not speak the language and are trying to find your place in an unfamiliar city. It does help, at least, that some things are taken care of at Juventus that would not have been back at Liverpool.

“The setup here is great, because we don’t have to wash our kit,” says Zelem. “That’s good. Because at home we had to wash our kit! Everything else is pretty similar, so for me that’s a huge positive. Because, again, that move from England to Italy people would maybe have seen as a step back but in terms of professionalism, Juventus has really pushed that bar up.”

The Bianconeri served notice of their ambition when they won their first official game 13-0, against Torino in the Coppa Italia. Zelem missed that match because of a bureaucratic hold-up but was part of the side who won 8-0 in the second leg. She then came off the bench in the club’s league opener, a 3-0 triumph away against Mozzanica.

Katie Zelem is hopeful her move will can help her fulfil her ambition of playing for England. Photograph: Daniele Badolato/Juventus FC via Getty Images

She is not guaranteed a place in the side. It will take time to adapt fully to a new league and a new style of football. Zelem cites Fara Williams and Andrés Iniesta as her footballing role models, and seeks to perform in a similar way, dictating play from a position behind the attack. It is not easy to make a side tick when you are still learning how to communicate with your team-mates.

Some roles, though, come naturally. Zelem was the unofficial changing-room DJ at Liverpool, and already has the same title in Turin. “It took four days,” she says. “The girls were all very impressed back home.

“The music taste is a little bit different here to there, though. You like a lot of cheesy things over here, I’ve noticed. In England, it’s a bit like: ‘What’s the vibe today, a bit chilled, or a bit more of something else?’ Here it’s just upbeat all the time, no matter what’s happening. And they like a lot of cheesy songs they can sing along to.”

Language barrier notwithstanding, it is easy to see how Zelem has become a popular figure already at Juventus. Her enthusiasm is infectious, that laugh never far away. But she is also deadly serious about using this experience to improve herself as a player. Most of all, she hopes it will bring her a step closer to her ultimate goal: playing for England’s senior women’s team.

“At 10 years old, did I even know that this could be a career? No. But did I know it was possible to play for England? Yeah. That is something I’ve always dreamed of, and that is something I always will dream of.”

Until it comes true, at any rate. Unlike a move to Juventus, it does not require an active imagination to foresee a Lionesses debut somewhere in Zelem’s future.