Interview

Montemurro – We had to draw them out in wide areas

Montemurro

We returned to winning ways in the Women’s Super League on Thursday night as we beat Liverpool 3-2 on the road.

The Reds boasted the WSL’s fifth strongest defence coming into this fixture, and they initially took the lead, but some impressive wide play and passing combinations saw us fight back to secure all three points and keep our title hopes alive. 

We spoke to Joe Montemurro after the final whistle - and this is what he said:

on all three goals coming from crosses…

Their full backs were very aggressive in terms of coming inside and following our wingers so we found the space out wide and we worked a lot to that. We got the joy from exposing them in wide areas and the finishing was exceptional.

on countering Liverpool’s strengths…

We had to wait. The thing is they were so deep and we usually now build up and usually break a line or a second line to then penetrate and we weren’t able to do that in the first half. We had to sort of draw them out in terms of wide areas and low and behold we got the rewards.

on the goals conceded…

It’s very uncharacteristic, we’re usually very good in our understanding in transition moments. We’re very good in preparing ourselves in terms of when we need to drop off and when we need to. Between bad body positions against Man City, between situations that is keeping the press one way. I think it’s more of the phase before that I’ve been working on than the actual goal itself, that’s what’s concerned me a little bit because even if we go back to the Man City game and there were opportunities to keep them one way and keep them away from goal. We didn’t do that and Man City got the result that day. Today was the same , we should have been in more advanced position to press the ball. We got caught on the way back with balls over the top.

on the injuries in the squad…

With Kim Little it’s very interesting because it was just bruising and we thought we would give her one more week and she would be fine. We took some scans and it was more than that. Lia Walti, she just pinched her hamstring the day before the game doing some rondo and possession work. It’s developed a little bit more. Are they fatigue? I don’t know. Are they things that were there for a while and it developed? I don’t know. It’s unfortunate and we felt that missing the Man City game they would be back.

on Katrine Veje’s injury…

Katrine is going through some issues at the moment and we’re just supporting her on that. That’s been another one where unfortunately you tick it off at the start of the year as part of the squad but it’s unfortunately hasn’t developed.

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