The Fosse Way

This game sent me into a sort of existential crisis about what exactly our purpose is in the WSL. In our previous WSL fixture, we lost 4-1 to Brighton, and perhaps more damagingly, we lost Jutta Rantala for an unspecified, extended period of time. With us struggling to make any sort of impression in the final third, we need as many attacking players as possible available in the vain hope that one of them will hit some sort of form. To compound all of that, there was a pretty rough 3-0 defeat to Crystal Palace in the League Cup.

With all of that considered, we came into this game on a downer and left on a slightly deeper one after a 3-0 defeat at home to Manchester City. This was a match between 1st and 9th, with the divide feeling a lot deeper than 8 places. We defended valiantly until the 74th minute and then everything fell apart. Similar to our brave 1-0 defeat at Chelsea earlier in the year, we looked incredibly solid at the expense of offering anything going forward and when that first goal goes in, it’s game over.

The first 70 odd minutes of the game were pretty much the same thing. We sat back in solid lines of 5 and 4, with one of Hannah Cain or Shannon O’Brien up top and ready to chase any long and hopeful balls from the back. The plan from Rick Passmoor was clearly to let them run at us and keep a solid shape. Only the most dangerous of runs would draw a defender out of their place, it felt like Subbuteo vs FIFA (or EA FC, if anyone calls it that?)

The plan largely worked and frustrated Manchester City, limiting them to shots from distance and set deliveries from set pieces. We did lose Hlin Eiriksdottir to injury int he first half and hopefully that won’t be too long, as we need all the help we can get. For a long time, whatever came up, Janice Cayman, Chantelle Swaby and especially Celeste Boureille were up to dealing with it. It felt like some Barclays glory years defending, everything that came into the box was sent packing with a thunderous header. A look at the average position of both sides tells a lot of the story. Leicester had every player’s average position within their own half and Manchester City had all but one outfield player at the halfway line or further. 

On the rare occasion we did manage to get forward on a break, whoever had the ball at their feet had very little support going forward. The wingers were doing an enormous amount of working tracking back and when they had the opportunity to attack, you can’t blame them for not quite having the lungs to get forward ahead of a Manchester City side designed to stay high up the pitch and counter press so effectively.

Manchester City looked sloppy in possession, with one touch passes often going astray and a lack of rhythm to their play. We benefitted from this but we it felt like we put them in that position with how we defended. Our attempts at attacking were encapsulated in a moment when Olivia McLoughlin played a good ball behind Manchester City’s defence that would have seen Cain through on goal, albeit with a considerable distance to go. As we’d sat so deep, Manchester City were able to be so high up the pitch already that goalkeeper Ayaka Yamashita was already not far away from the path of the ball and dealt with it easily.

It’s understandable that when we suddenly had the chance to attack, we weren’t in the positions or the mindset to actually do anything of any substance. I think being able to go from first to fifth (or maybe just third) gear is going to be something that Passmoor will need to unlock to give us a bit of something for the future. There was a moment where Emily Van Egmond had plenty of time and space and the luxury of a runner going beyond and the cogs whirred, but the gears didn’t shift and she unfathomably passed backwards.

In the 69th minute, Manchester City brought on Brazil international Kerolin who looked free of the shackles of the previous 70 minutes of frustration and made this happen. From this point on, the whole one point heist plan fell down in the 74th minute when a wonky clearance from Boureille landed the ball into the path of Bunny Shaw. If you were going to choose someone you least wanted to pounce on a loose ball in the box, it’s her. It was another cruel blow after so much good work by our defence and yet again it felt like it was all over. 

A stat popped up on the TV coverage in the 80th minute, we had one touch in their box and Manchester City had 53 in ours. That’s the story of the match in a nutshell. But after that first goal more felt inevitable. McLoughlin put in a rough shoulder barge on Kerolin in the box that would have easily been a penalty with VAR. But Manchester City got a corner instead and some instant karmic retribution when Shaw nodded in from a well-delivered Lauren Hemp corner.

Kerolin should have scored after forcing an excellent double save from an onrushing Janina Leitzig towards the end of the match but she did manage to get her goal, to cap off a game-changing performance, a few minutes into stoppage time.

No one expected us to win this and the plan to sit back and absorb pressure is, as ever a decent plan A. But again, it is goals we need and someone to score them. With one game against London City Lionesses before the winter break, hopefully Passmoor can get a bit of money to bring in some more firepower with Rantala out for a while and Eiriksdottir hopefully not out for too long.