A hard one to swallow for Arsenal Women on opening day
On Sunday afternoon, Arsenal Women’s fans flooded into the Emirates for the opening game of The Women’s Super League season. 54,115 people in attendance, breaking the all-time highest attendance record for any WSL game and it was only the first game of the season.
The mood was incredible, with the crowd buzzing for kick off, Arsenal Women came out firing. With starting debuts from Alessia Russo and Cloe Laccase, who both looked like they were just taking in the atmosphere at The Emirates and throughout the game both seem to have formed a great connection through the middle of the pitch.
A busy first half saw the Arsenal Women have a lot of the ball, constantly putting pressure on the Liverpool defence and forcing some incredible saves from the Liverpool’s keeper and blocks from their defence. No matter how much pressure we put onto them, we just couldn’t seem to break through. With 12 corners in just the first half, Arsenal Women were looking to create chances from set pieces, but just couldn’t seem to break down Liverpool’s defence.
Passing the ball wide around the pitch to try and create spaces for chances, Kim Little commanded the midfield, linking up well with Lacasse and Russo, creating plenty of chances but just weren’t clinical enough. Caitlin Foord saw a lot of the ball down the left wing and looked extremely dangerous when linking up with Katie McCabe. Going into the tunnels at half time we were looking positive and should have probably been in front by a few.
In the second half Liverpool came out looking more lively and ready to go, while Arsenal Women looked to have come out looking a bit tired and were making some sloppy decisions. Only taking Liverpool 3 minutes to break through our defence and slip one past Zinsberger. A ball that could and should have been cleared before it made it to the feet of the player in the box, but it wasn’t dealt with. We looked to have just switched off for a second and Liverpool took advantage via Miri Taylor, putting them 1-0 in front.
The Gunners continued to put the pressure on and try get an equaliser, but nothing seemed to be working, Liverpool staying very solid defensively. Amanda Ilestedt and Kyra Cooney-Cross came off the bench to make their WSL debuts, Ilestedt coming on just after 60 minutes and had an impressive half an hour on the pitch, and Eidevall made the late change of Cooney-Cross who looked promising while she was on the pitch.
A tough one to swallow for our Arsenal women and a hard start to a high anticipated season. Liverpool walking away with the three points but hopefully Arsenal walk away with some lessons learnt and we now focus on the next game against Manchester United.
Video Highlights: How Liverpool shocked the Arsenal Women in record-breaking Emirates game
What’s your thoughts Gooners?
Daisy Mae
Follow JustArsenal’s Gooner Women on Just Gooner Women on Twitter for regular updates on the Arsenal Womens Team!
Do you want to read more about the Arsenal Women’s Team? Click here….
