Rehanne Skinner said that West Ham United women’s team 'have to pick themselves up and go again' after a disappointing 3-1 defeat to Liverpool on Sunday afternoon.
The Hammers were back in Barclays Women’s Super League action as they travelled to Merseyside for the clash with the Reds and grew into the game at Prenton Park as the two teams sussed each other out in the opening exchanges.
However, they went behind when Ceri Holland prodded the ball into the path of former Hammer Leanne Kiernan, who scored from close range. Mackenzie Arnold was injured as she reached for the ball with Holland, but the referee allowed the goal to stand.
After half-time, Missy Bo Kearns extended the hosts’ lead when she flashed a header in at the near post, before Sophie Roman Haug added a third with just under 20 minutes of the contest remaining as she ghosted in at the back post.
Riko Ueki was alert to take advantage of a poor pass from Liverpool goalkeeper Rachel Laws as she scored a consolation, but it would be too little too late for Skinner’s side, who could add any further goals as they went down 3-1.
Skinner told West Ham TV at full time that there were positive for the team to take into their upcoming home fixture against Chelsea, but that there are also improvements to be made in the way that the team compete physically throughout the game.
I felt that the first goal comes against the run of play.
We had a better first half in terms of how we controlled the game that what we have had recently. We’ve been quite slow to start some games, so it was something that we’d really been focusing on.
If I’m honest, I can’t understand how the goal stands based on the foul on Mackenzie [Arnold] and the fact that she’s got a cut on the head from studs being up in that situation. It’s a bit of a blow and a bit deflating.
Fair play to the players because straight after that, we created two massive chances before half-time and we want to be more clinical in taking those.
It would have put us in a good position heading into the break if we had been able to do so.
At times in the second half, we were a little flat.
We were obviously trying to change the energy with the players who we were bringing off the bench. Liverpool are good at making the game directional, transitional and all of a sudden, you’re in a physical battle for the majority of the game, and I feel like we’ve got to get better at competing with that.
Part of the conversation at the end of the game was that we’ve got to expect that side of the game and we have to deal with that a little bit more.
For the players, I think they feel a little bit deflated by some of the decisions today.
However, it’s important that we pick ourselves up and work really hard moving forwards into next week’s game.
We have to take the positives that we can from the game, particularly the first half because it’s the best that we’ve started a game for a while and doing that throughout the course of a game is going to be the key focus for us moving forward.
We’ve been playing well at home recently and making things really difficult for teams.
The team are determined, we’re working hard every day and we’ll go into the game and do everything we can to get points.
We appreciate the support from the traveling fans today, they were great as always. We’re grateful for all of their support and we look forward to the numbers that we’ll have cheering us on at home next weekend.
