Press conference

Every word from Eidevall's pre-Zurich presser

Jonas Eidevall

As we prepare to host the Swiss champions FC Zurich in the Women's Champions League on Thursday, manager Jonas Eidevall held his usual press conference.

Eidevall spoke with the media, who quizzed him on squad rotation in a relentless schedule, our current defensive success, and how to remain humble in the wake of huge victories.

Here is everything the boss had to say:

On whether he’s expecting FC Zurich to set up in a deep block tomorrow…

From seeing their [Juventus] game, it painted a very consistent picture. So of course, it's one of the ways we could prepare for them to play.

On whether the wide forward position is a good route into the starting XI…

It is a position that we have used Mana in a couple of times last season. She can be in that position if it's a little bit more like an inverted winger, compared to a really wide forward. I think, of course, when we are missing players that will take away some options or alternatives for us to rotate the squad. But I feel confident when I see the options that are available in front of me before the game here tomorrow, that we're in a good position to put fresh minds and fresh legs on the pitch.

On whether our impressive victory against Lyon said anything new about what we can achieve in Europe…

It's a good question. I don't know if I think about it and that deep level - we go game by game. We try to apply ourselves as good as possible for every game. To make things really simple, that's what we do. And then what potential ceilings do we have? Well we'll have to find out. But if we do 100% both in preparation and execution, we don't have to regret anything. And I think when you do that, nights like that can happen in Lyon. It's not a guarantee, but it can happen and it was beautiful to be a part of. But we have to keep working and keep having that mindset and focus and maybe it can happen again.

On whether Mana Iwabuchi is likely to get more minutes against Zurich…

Good try - trying to ask me about my team selection tomorrow. I never tell! But you and everyone else, except for the players, will have to wait for tomorrow.

On why Iwabuchi was brought on so late against Liverpool at the weekend…

That's a management decision. For me, I treat every game with the utmost respect. And we saw when we used our last opportunity to sub against Ajax in the second game there, and Beth Mead got a concussion and had to be carried off. We had to finish that game with ten players. We know that that's always a risk, making the use of the last sub too early, because you don't know what's going to happen. In hindsight, it's very easy to sit and say that, 'Oh, you could have used that opportunity earlier because now you know how it's going to play out.' But when you use that opportunity, maybe 15 minutes before the game is over, and you all of a sudden have to replace your goalkeeper or to deal with something else on the pitch, you end up turning a comfortable situation into a dangerous one. I'm the only one to blame and I need to take responsibility in those situations. And that's what I do by treating every second of the game with the utmost respect.

On whether anything has changed since last year to improve English clubs’ chances to progress in the Champions League…

No, those results were despite the system and not because of the system.

On whether he still believes more can be done with the WSL schedule to help this…

Of course. It's just we see the other teams that we are playing in Europe. When we played the qualifiers against Ajax, they didn't have a weekend game in between the two games because the Dutch Association, they want to prioritise to see if they can go into the group stage because they know that their players will get more competitive games. So they choose to do it like that. I think and what I'm looking for is to have that discussion with the clubs and the authorities that run the league, to see how do we give the clubs that compete in Europe the best possible conditions in order to achieve results that are good - both short term but also long term for the league. But we don't have those discussions and I think that is not good enough.

On how pleased he is with our current defensive unit…

I think that the application has been brilliant from many individuals, and that's been put together into a unit so I'm very pleased with how we have risen to that challenge.

On whether he sees the next two games as an opportunity to secure knockout qualification and therefore rest players…

No, it's game by game. We have to do our part, prepare to be as fit as possible, execute as well as possible. Then we'll have to see where that leads us in the league table.

On our longevity in Europe and whether the gap between ourselves and Barcelona is lessening…

For us to play one really good game away to Lyon and get a great result and to start speaking about us winning the whole competition, I don't like that. I don't think that's humble enough. That's not where we come from. We're still at a place where we know we're a very good football team but we need to work extremely hard to develop in order to fulfil our potential as a team. That power and obligation from history, we know that there are so many great football players and managers that has put our club in the position it is in today. And we are so determined to try and leave this club in an even better place than we came to it.