As the 2023/24 season draws to a close, Jonas Eidevall has reflected on our progress as a club and where our sights are set in the future.
"I think it makes more sense to summarise the season after we've played all the last three games," said Eidevall at his pre-Everton press conference. "But speaking generally, we want to win the league. We are Arsenal, we want to win all competitions that we are in.
"We’ve been saying that we needed to be more consistent in order to have more points than we have right now. That’s one part, but it’s also true during the season that we’ve seen a lot of progression and development in the way that we’ve been playing.
The 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup and UEFA Women's Champions League qualification meant that pre-season was unusually short for our squad last summer and Eidevall pointed to this as a contributing factor for our slow start to the campaign.
"We had very little time going into the season when it started and we had new players coming in, so we didn’t start with the same core group of players that finished the last season and so on.
"I think that’s also something that we need to fix for next season to come in at a higher starting point, because we can see that we can develop and progress as a team during the season, which is really important, but it’s also important to start at a higher level than we have done this year.
Our head coach referenced this season's disappointment in Europe after being agonisingly close to the Champions League final last time around.
"When we look at ourselves in the mirror, we see a European club. It is really important for us to be in Europe, both to compete, but also to get experience there.
"We would have loved to go to an FA Cup final. There are definitely things that we can do better and we know that.
With fixtures against Everton, Manchester City and Brighton still to play, Eidevall believes that finishing strongly will provide the momentum heading into next year.
"Now we still need to make the most out of the three games that we have left. That gives us a good foundation for next season."
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