Cleat Cute Review | Meryl Wilsner | Is It Worth Reading?

Two teammates on the US Women’s National Team, one veteran fighting her way back from injury and the rookie who took her spot — forced to share a locker room, a starting XI, and eventually a bed. Cleat Cute is a joyful, high-heat sapphic sports rom-com that readers either sprinted through in a single sitting or set down cold. Here’s exactly where it lands.

If you love slow-burn-adjacent, banter-heavy sapphic romance with a big beating heart, Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner belongs on your radar — but it comes with a few caveats worth knowing before you lace up.

Our take: A warm, funny, deeply horny friends-with-benefits-to-lovers story carried by Phoebe’s irrepressible joy and one of the more thoughtful ADHD-coded heroines in the genre — even if the “rivals” framing oversells the conflict and the internal monologue runs long.

The Evidence Scorecard

We score every book across eight dimensions using real reader data and close reading. Here is how Cleat Cute performs, dimension by dimension.

Overall ★★★★ 7.4/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Weighted 3.7/5 across nearly 47,000 combined Amazon and Goodreads ratings
• ✓ A genre standout for sapphic sports romance, a still-underserved niche
• ✓ Consistently praised as Wilsner’s funniest, most alive book
• ✓ Polarizing pacing keeps it just shy of a top-tier score

Romance ★★★★ 7.8/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Friends-with-benefits to lovers with genuine tenderness underneath the heat
• ✓ Phoebe’s open-hearted pursuit of Grace is disarmingly sweet
• ✓ Emotional intimacy grows convincingly alongside the physical
• ✓ “Rivals” label overpromises: the actual conflict is mild

Characters ★★★★½ 8.2/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Phoebe reads as joyfully, authentically ADHD-coded and beloved for it
• ✓ Grace’s guardedness and injury arc give real emotional stakes
• ✓ Distinct voices; the leads feel like actual professional athletes
• ✓ Side cast is warm but lightly sketched

Writing ★★★ 6.8/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Snappy, funny dialogue that carries whole scenes
• ✓ Sports action is written with genuine knowledge and momentum
• ✓ Heavy internal monologue is the single most common complaint
• ✓ A few readers flagged uneven editing and repetition

Emotional Impact ★★★★ 7.3/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Grace’s fear of being replaced lands with real ache
• ✓ Big, cathartic joy in the back half for invested readers
• ✓ Lower-stakes conflict means less white-knuckle tension
• ✓ Payoff feels earned for those who click with the voice

Heat Level ★★★★½ 8.0/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Notably steamy — among Wilsner’s most explicit work
• ✓ Frequent, well-written, consent-forward sex scenes
• ✓ Chemistry between Phoebe and Grace is a near-universal highlight
• ✓ Some readers found the sheer volume of spice crowded out plot

Ending ★★★★ 7.5/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Satisfying, feel-good HEA with the World Cup as backdrop
• ✓ Grace’s growth pays off emotionally
• ✓ Sports-and-love-both-win finale delivers the wish fulfillment
• ✓ A touch tidy for readers who wanted more friction

Re-read Value ★★★★ 7.2/10

Evidence:

• ✓ Comfort-read energy for fans of joyful, low-angst romance
• ✓ Banter and spice reward repeat visits
• ✓ Easy to dip back into favorite scenes
• ✓ Less re-read pull for those lukewarm on the pacing

Quick Facts

Title	Cleat Cute
Author	Meryl Wilsner
Published	September 19, 2023 (St. Martin’s Griffin)
Length	328 pages
Tropes	Rivals to lovers, teammates, friends with benefits, forced proximity
Heat Level	8/10 — explicit and frequent
Setting	US Women’s National Team, road to the World Cup
POV	Dual third person (Phoebe & Grace)
Ending	HEA — feel-good and hopeful

You’ll Love This If…

• ✓ You want a rare, well-executed sapphic sports romance
• ✓ You adore a sunny, chaotic golden-retriever heroine chasing a guarded one
• ✓ You like your friends-with-benefits arcs steamy and emotionally earnest
• ✓ You enjoyed the vibe of Ted Lasso or A League of Their Own
• ✓ You want ADHD representation that feels lived-in, not tokenized

Avoid If…

• You need a true rivals-to-lovers with sustained on-page conflict
• Heavy, looping internal monologue pulls you out of a story
• You prefer plot-forward romance over spice-forward romance
• You want high external stakes and slow-burn tension
• Frequent explicit scenes aren’t your thing

Book Synopsis

Grace Henderson has been a fixture on the US Women’s National Team for a decade, a disciplined star who long ago traded the joy of the game for the pressure of being the best. When an injury sidelines her, a brash, grinning upstart named Phoebe Matthews seizes the opening — and Phoebe plays with exactly the uncomplicated delight Grace has lost. To Grace, Phoebe is a rival and a threat. To Phoebe, Grace is the idol she trained her whole life to stand beside.

One reckless kiss turns their wary standoff into a friends-with-benefits arrangement neither of them is emotionally equipped to keep casual. As the team grinds toward the World Cup and Grace fights her way back to fitness, the two women have to figure out whether they can share a pitch, a spotlight, and a future — without one of them having to lose for the other to win.

My Review

Let me start where Cleat Cute absolutely delivers: Phoebe Matthews is one of the most purely lovable romance heroines I’ve read in ages. She is loud, warm, impulsive, and coded as ADHD in a way that never feels like a checklist — it’s baked into how she moves through the world, how she plays, and how she loves. Watching her chase Grace with zero guile is the emotional engine of the whole book, and it’s a joy.

Grace is the trickier, more interesting half of the equation: a veteran terrified of being replaced, so armored that she’s forgotten why she started playing. Her arc — from resentment to trust to genuine partnership — is where Wilsner does her best emotional work. When the two of them finally stop pretending the sex is just sex, the payoff is real.

The spice deserves its own paragraph. This is easily Wilsner’s steamiest book, and the chemistry is a near-universal highlight even among readers who had reservations elsewhere. If you want a sapphic romance that’s both tender and genuinely explicit, this scratches that itch.

My honest caveats: the “rivals-to-lovers” billing oversells the conflict — these two are teammates who like each other almost immediately, so the tension is softer than the marketing implies. And the internal monologue runs long; there are stretches where the plot idles while a character narrates her feelings in circles. If you click with the voice, you won’t care. If you don’t, it’ll test your patience. For me, Phoebe’s charm and the sports-romance rarity carried it comfortably over the line.

What Readers Are Saying

We read through hundreds of Goodreads and Amazon reviews to capture the real conversation around Cleat Cute — and it’s a genuinely divided one. Here’s what readers actually love, and the criticisms that come up again and again.

What readers love

• ✓ “Sports lesbians, rejoice.” Reviewers repeatedly celebrate it as a rare, well-done sapphic sports romance — many call it Wilsner’s best and funniest book yet.
• ✓ Phoebe. The rookie’s joyful, ADHD-coded energy is the most-praised element, with readers calling her one of the most lovable leads they’ve read.
• ✓ The heat. Even critical reviewers concede the chemistry and steam are excellent — “fucking phenomenal” was one five-star verdict.
• ✓ The Ted Lasso comparison. Fans loved the warm, sports-comedy tone and the “joy of the game” theme.
• ✓ Representation. Readers valued the authentic ADHD portrayal and unapologetically queer world.

The criticisms and negative opinions

The one- to three-star reviews are consistent about what didn’t work, and it’s worth listing plainly:

• “There was more internal monologuing than sex” — the most common complaint. Multiple readers found the endless in-head narration exhausting and said it “dampened the entire experience.”
• It isn’t actually rivals-to-lovers. A frequent two-star gripe: “Can you really consider a book rivals to lovers if the characters are on the same team and they’re not rivals at any point?” Readers felt misled by the marketing.
• Too much spice, not enough plot. Some felt the sheer volume of sex scenes crowded out story and character development.
• Editing complaints. One blunt one-star review simply asked, “do people not have editors anymore?” — several flagged repetition and pacing that idles.
• Middle-of-the-road for longtime fans. Readers who’d loved Wilsner’s earlier books called this one “direct middle of the road” and were “SO upset” it didn’t land the way they hoped.

Net-net: Cleat Cute is a book people either race through and adore or bounce off entirely, and the split comes down almost entirely to how you feel about the introspective, spice-heavy, low-conflict style. Go in wanting joyful, steamy comfort rather than tense rivalry, and you’ll likely land on the “love it” side.

Romance Profile

Pairing	Phoebe Matthews & Grace Henderson (F/F)
Dynamic	Golden retriever rookie × guarded veteran
Central Trope	Friends with benefits catching feelings
Conflict	Fear of replacement, guardedness, casual-vs-real
Spice	8/10 — explicit, frequent, consent-forward
Angst	Low-to-moderate

Emotional Profile

• ✓ Joyful and funny more than angsty
• ✓ Tender beneath the banter and spice
• ✓ Quietly moving in Grace’s fear-of-being-replaced arc
• ✓ Comfort-read warmth with a triumphant finish

Content Warnings

• Explicit sexual content (frequent)
• Sports injury and rehabilitation
• Anxiety around career/identity and being replaced
• Brief references to competitive pressure and burnout

Book DNA

60%	Steamy friends-with-benefits romance
20%	Women’s pro-soccer sports drama
15%	Character study of joy vs. pressure
5%	Team-family comedy

Similar Books You Might Enjoy

• Mistakes Were Made by Meryl Wilsner — her steamy campus-set age-gap romance, for readers who click with her voice
• Delilah Green Doesn’t Care by Ashley Herring Blake — banter-forward sapphic rom-com energy
• One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston — joyful, queer, big-hearted contemporary romance
• The Pairing by Casey McQuiston — for more spicy, sunny, character-driven romance

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For more like this, browse our full guide to lesbian forced proximity romance, and if you love a slow-burn reunion just as much, don’t miss our Sapphic Second Chance Romance Books roundup.

About the Author

Meryl Wilsner is the author of the breakout sapphic slow burn Something to Talk About and the steamy age-gap romance Mistakes Were Made. Known for warm, character-driven queer love stories, Wilsner has become a reliable name for readers seeking contemporary F/F romance with heart and heat. Cleat Cute marked their move into sports romance and quickly became a genre favorite.

Read more Meryl Wilsner reviews →

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Cleat Cute a standalone?

Yes. It’s a complete standalone romance with its own HEA and no cliffhanger.

How spicy is Cleat Cute?

Very — it’s Meryl Wilsner’s steamiest book, with frequent, explicit, consent-forward sex scenes. We rate the heat 8/10.

Is it really rivals-to-lovers?

Sort of. Grace initially sees Phoebe as a threat to her spot, but the two become friendly quickly, so the “rivals” conflict is much softer than the marketing suggests. It’s more teammates-to-lovers with a friends-with-benefits arc.

Do I need to know soccer to enjoy it?

No. The sports scenes are written with real knowledge but the romance and characters carry the story; casual readers won’t feel lost.

Is there ADHD representation?

Yes. Phoebe is warmly and authentically ADHD-coded, and readers widely praise the portrayal as lived-in rather than tokenized.

Does it have a happy ending?

Yes — a feel-good, hopeful HEA with the World Cup as a triumphant backdrop.

Why do some readers rate it low?

The most common complaints are heavy internal monologue, a “rivals” label that overpromises the conflict, and a spice-heavy, plot-light balance. It’s a polarizing read.

Is Cleat Cute connected to Meryl Wilsner’s other books?

No, it’s unconnected to Something to Talk About or Mistakes Were Made — but fans of those books will recognize the voice.

Final Verdict

Cleat Cute is a joyful, steamy, big-hearted sapphic sports romance anchored by one of the most lovable heroines in recent memory. It won’t work for everyone — the introspective, low-conflict, spice-forward style genuinely divides readers — but if you go in wanting warm, funny, unapologetically horny comfort rather than tense rivalry, it’s a delight. A worthy addition to any forced-proximity shelf and a rare win for the sapphic sports-romance niche. Our weighted verdict: 3.7 / 5.

Where to Buy

Buy Cleat Cute on Amazon

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