Joe Montemurro doesn't taste defeat often, so when he does, it hurts.
Sunday's 2-1 defeat at Chelsea was only the eighth time we have left a stadium empty-handed since his first match in our dugout back in December 2017.
However, on only one occasion have we failed to win the next game following a defeat during his reign, and our head coach is hoping to bounce back once more when we travel to Slavia Prague in the Women's Champions League last-16 on Wednesday.
Here’s what Montemurro said after Sunday’s defeat:
on whether the scoreline reflected the performance…
Yes, we were good in the first half, but they were better than us in the second half.
on the message to his players over the next few days…
We have a big Champions League game on Wednesday so we’re going to have to forget about this one. We’re disappointed that we made some fundamental errors in crucial parts of the park today and that’s very unlike us. We didn’t handle the pressure well in the second half and now we need to regroup.
on why there was a lack of intensity in the second half…
It’s difficult to say. We couldn’t keep the ball and our intensity is all ball-based, so we were punished because of those fundamental errors. It’s very unlike us.
on Chelsea…
With the size and individual talent of the squad that they’ve got, they really should be up there every year. Today’s a reflection of who they are because they’re a good team. They’re a powerful team and we know that. They’ve got a squad of nearer 25, whereas we have a squad of 18 players, but that’s not an excuse. That’s the way we’ve chosen the squad and that’s what we believe works for us.
on whether it was his plan for us to play on the counter in the second half...
No, the game turned out like that. The game became long and and it became a transition game. The fundamentals of the way we play is to keep the ball well and we didn’t do that at all. We got punished for errors, created turnovers for them and were punished for it.
on why he moved Roord out wide…
We felt that if someone could play closer to Viv, we could overload that area and allow Jordan Nobbs to take the space that Jill was vacating. We got behind them a couple times but it just wasn’t to be.
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