This game was a big deal. As soon as we knew it was happening, a month ago now, it has been looming over us. I have to confess, I was excited for it. Given we’ve spent most of the season in a perpetual state of 1-0 down, I was looking forward to a game with some jeopardy and a chance for something great. This was not great.
It was a beautiful day at The Valley, in stark contrast to 2 hours of some of the most stodgy, lifeless football you’ve ever seen. It ended 0-0 after extra time, and we were blessed with a truly hideous penalty shoot-out that Charlton won 2-1, sending us down to WSL 2 and sending Charlton up.
There was a lot at play here. The weight of the game, the blazing South London heat and two teams in awful form. It was the unstoppable fall vs the never-ending drop. With such a lack of quality from either side, it was always going to be whoever wanted it more. I’m aware this is ‘proper football man’ talk, but when there’s a lack of tactical plan, vagaries like grit and determination are all you can have. You’d need a lot of spades to shovel the grit that Leicester didn’t have today.
Katie Keane, who is fast becoming a fan favourite, started in goal. You’d have to wonder if she’s up for staying as a starter in WSL 2 or if she’d prefer to be number 2 at a bigger club. Emma Jansson, Sari Kees and Julie Thibaud were in the back 3, with a midfield four of Asmita Ale, Olivia McLoughlin, Sam Tierney and Sarah Mayling. Up front, we had Jutta Rantala behind a front two of Hannah Cain and Shannon O’Brien.
Early on, Charlton focused on knocking the ball over the top of our defence and getting in behind with the decent pace up top. We seemed to just lump it up to a few players that could neither flick it on nor get behind the defence, so Charlton certainly had the rub over us in an attacking sense. When Thibaud wasn’t getting it launched, the general pattern of play tended to be Ale or Mayling with the ball at their feet on the wing and looking to get the ball to Rantala. Presumably, the plan was for Rantala to get the ball behind her to onrushing midfielders or Cain and O’Brien, but we never got to see that. Turns out that if you want to put all your attacking play through one player, marking them is a pretty good idea.
It took until the 18th minute before anything looked dangerous. Ale, very professionally, fouled Karin Muya just outside the box and got a yellow for it. Muya did look handy down the right for Charlton, but much like ourselves, they tended to cross into an empty box too. The resulting free kick passed without incident. Take note of that, because this is a theme that runs throughout this game. McLoughlin was found at the edge of a box after a corner, and she found the space to get a shot away. It looked good, but it flew towards goal at a pretty leisurely speed. To give her some praise, McLoughlin was everywhere she needed to be at all times today. She might not have always made the right decision or pulled it off, but definitely put in the miles.
We’ve seen a few goals, most from O’Brien, come from us pressing the opposition defence and forcing them into an error. Charlton’s back four looked skittish in possession, and they were giving lower league. There was some persistent fouling by Charlton that the referee made very little of. I don’t know if it was a conscious tactic to rough up the big-time WSL mega stars of Leicester City, but it was noticeable. In the 35th minute, we defended a corner with all 10 outfielders in the box. With more than 55 minutes left of the game, Leicester had such little belief that they’d be able to come back from 1-0 down that they had everyone in the box like they were protecting a 1-0 lead in the 90th minute. This felt like a microcosm of everything wrong with this team.
We spent the last 10 minutes of the half being hammered by Charlton. The decision-making was glacial from everyone here. Every time a player had the ball at their feet, wherever they were on the pitch, they’d boot it as far away as possible, but still take a couple of seconds to decide to do this again and again. There was a proper goalmouth scramble after a corner from us that saw Whitehouse in the Charlton goal make an amazing reaction save that later drew praise from England number one Hannah Hampton. We then got another corner that was sent straight into the side netting. This was a game with high stakes on about 15 different TV channels, and it was certainly not a good advert for the game. Here’s a classic catchphrase from me for dedicated readers of these match reports; we were lucky to go in 0-0 at half-time!
After a quick break, the second half reared its ugly head, and we sat down for another 45 minutes of hellish football on a ground that was fast becoming an oven. It was a record attendance for Charlton’s women’s team, just under 4000. I just know that all 4000-ish souls in the Valley had sent out a private prayer to the football gods to not let this go to extra time. The second half started with a few corners for Charlton, featuring one that also went into the side netting. There were a total of 3 of these in the game, and it raises a question of quality for both teams. The fact that neither has a player that can consistently deliver a ball that even makes it into the box tells a large part of the story.
A big problem we had going forward was a complete lack of a focal point. With Rantala not being the kind of player who can take a ball down with her head or chest and flick it on to runners, she was easily marked out of the game. Because of this, it meant that players either lacked the confidence or freedom to take risks with the ball going forward, and it felt like a goal would be a genuinely unusual occurrence. In the 55th minute, Rick Passmoor took off Cain, Ale and Rantala for Rachel Williams, Ashleigh Neville and Emily van Egmond. It honestly felt like a mistake to take off a few players who have got legs to replace them with ‘experience’. The fact that we were able to bring on proven WSL and international quality at this time gives you some idea of the gulf between our squad and Charlton’s. The changes worked, though, as Neville was sending balls into the box down the left, van Egmond, with her height, gave Neville someone to aim at, and Williams was able to hold up the ball from the flick-ons. We saw a few passages of play that resemble the football that you or I know today, and it felt like there was a chance we could do this.
Just having some players who could put together an attacking move unfortunately didn’t result in them actually doing it that often. Jansson was found lacking on the ball a few times, including one that could have seen Charlton clean through on goal from the halfway line. We were still mostly playing hit-and-hope football, minus the hope, and the frustration in the crowd was palpable. O’Brien was still harrying defenders and running hard in the channels, but there were so many times someone would get forward, look up and see no one in the box and cross it in anyway. There was a moment from an attacking corner when the ball landed at McLoughlin’s feet, and she took too long to get the ball to Williams in space. It caught her in the middle of her stride, and Williams couldn’t quite get it out of her feet. This was precisely the point when disappointment turned to anger in the away crowd. There were chants to bring Mouchon on from around the 60th minute onwards. Spoiler alert: she came on in the 111th, with just 9 minutes remaining. Why she gets so few minutes is a complete mystery, when she is one of our only players who is willing to run at an opposition defence.
In the 80th minute, presumably, word spread to the players that they would go down if they lost this one, and they seemed to start trying to score a goal. In the end, this was much ado about nothing, and our fate was sealed to another 30 minutes in WSL purgatory. I wasn’t sure if there would be a noticeable difference in fitness between a WSL and WSL 2 side, but Charlton looked very leggy by the end of the game, and we still looked to have some vigour about us. Sending Mouchon on for a full 30 minutes of running at these tired defenders would have been a very smart move.
We predictably went into extra time at 0-0 and continued to cross the ball into the box with nobody there. On the other hand, Charlton looked all out of puff and all out of ideas. There was a moment when one of Charlton’s centre halves roamed up the pitch. A shot was curled in from their left wing, and it hit the bar, and the slowly gallivanting centre half headed it in while miles offside. Extra time was even more awfully stodgy stuff. We had so many shots, but they were all just random pops from range or bundling in crosses. McLoughlin hit a cross into the box late in extra time, and she dropped to the floor in agony. She’d covered every blade of grass and given everything for the team. Mouchon eventually came on with 10 minutes left and caused some havoc for Charlton’s tired defence, but she couldn’t make enough of a difference to save us from penalties.
After 120 minutes in purgatory, we were granted an appointment with St Peter of Penalties. Heaven or hell in 10 kicks or less. It was absolute agony. Keane saved two penalties and didn’t win. She more than did her bit, and our penalties were just atrocious. Where we go from here, god only knows. With money tight across the club as a whole, I can’t imagine there will be much investment coming into the women’s team. We haven’t deserved to stay up, but based on this showing, if Charlton could only beat us on penalties, they are going to have a long season in the WSL.
The Fosse Way 