Everton v Arsenal Women the Match Report. 8 games, 38 goals!

by Andrew Crawshaw

This match was broadcast live on the BBC Red Button and kicked off at 12:30 on Sunday 18 November.  The match was played at the Select Security Stadium the home of Southport Football Club.

Everton had sacked their manager, Andy Spence leaving after 12 years with the club as assistant to Mo Marley and then as head coach.  For Sunday’s game Jess Herst stepped up from her role as goalkeeping coach.  Such is the price for losing to Yeovil Town.

Arsenal started with

Sari Van Veenendaal

Leah Williamson, Louise Quinn, Dominique Bloodworth, Emma Mitchell

Leah Walti

Danielle Van de Donk, Jordan Nobbs c

Katie McCabe, Vivianne Miedema Beth Mead

Subs Pauline Peyraud-Magnin gk, Lisa Evans, Ava Kuyken, Ruby Grant, Paige Bailey-Gayle

So three U18s on the bench and Peyraud Magnin and Lisa Evans both nursing minor injuries.  Our small squad being stretched to the limit.

Everton

K Levell gk, F Bryson, G Brougham, G George c C Boye-Hlorah, Kaagman, S Magill, C Kelly, A James, Cain, M Finnigan

Subs

Flaherty, C Walker, Hinds, Bruinenberg, Hughes

Everton started with a very definite game plan designed to thwart and Frustrate Arsenal.  They played very deep with ten behind the ball and defended for their lives throwing themselves to block the ball and giving a very good imitation of the proverbial team bus parked in the 18 yard area.  They also tried to rely on quick breaks from defence in order to catch our defence out.

We were playing patiently seeking ways to break down the Everton Bus but our passing wasn’t up to our usual standards and the first 30 minutes or so was a pretty boring stalemate.  The few times we did manage to get a sight of the Everton Goalkeeper Kirstie Levell was having a ‘blinder’.

We steadily ramped up the pressure as half time approached, Katie McCabe, Vivianne Miedema and Beth Mead all being denied by some frantic last ditch defending and Kirstie Levell until Danielle van de Donk rifled in an unstoppable shot into the roof of the net from the left hand corner of the six yard box.  A telling blow in the last minute of the first half.

We started the second half in storming fashion with two goals inside the first five minutes of the half.  Beth Mead stormed down the right hand side and crossed the ball.  It was just a little behind Miedema but she managed to make a pass for Nobbs who controlled the ball and gave Kirstie Levell no chance from close range.  A minute later Miedema added her first and our third she picked up a poor defensive pass and was straight through on goal.  If she gets the ball past the defence and is one on one with the keeper there is only one place the ball is going to end up.

We somewhat took our foot off the gas after that but remained in complete command of the game.  Our fourth goal came in the 66th minute when Nobbs whipped the ball into the box and Miedema imperiously swept the ball into the net with a first time shot.

Emma Mitchell came off in the 70th minute being replaced by Ava Kuyken (she is studying for her A-levels at the moment so is 17/18) who has previously only had odd minutes this season.

Paige Bailey-Gayle (who was 17 on 12 November) was next to get her first senior outing coming on in .  She is an England U17 international forward.  She was very nearly on the score sheet but a through ball by Miedema didn’t quite have enough pace to enable her to get off a clean shot on goal.

The worst moment from an Arsenal point of view came in the 78th minute when Jordan Nobbs challenged for a ball in the centre circle and immediately went to ground holding her knee.  She needed oxygen on the field and was carried off on a stretcher.  After treatment Ruby Grant made her first team debut.  Ruby, a midfielder, is another U17 international who scored the fourth goal of seven in the England Women’s thrashing of Azerbaijan in September.

With a somewhat makeshift team at the end we nevertheless played out the remainder of the match for our sixth clean sheet out of our eight wins.

Second place club Man City sat out this week’s fixtures so our lead at the top of the table is now six points.

Our injury list has now lengthened again with 9 of out of our 19 player senior squad having some kind of problem and 5 out with long term issues.

• Pauline Peyraud-Magnin – Minor hand injury caused her to withdraw from the France squad during the last International break and meant that she could only be on the bench on Sunday
• Jessica Samuelsson – Game time being carefully managed following long term foot injury
• Lisa Evans – minor knock on international duty not likely to be long term
• Tabea Kemme – Knee Cartilage, she had a reaction from her knee following her injury time appearance against Reading now back in recovery
• Viktoria Schnaderback – Knee injured in pre season no date yet for her return
• Danielle Carter – Cruciate knee ligaments – now in the gym but unlikely to play again this season
• Kim Little – Broken ankle in the Chelsea match – out for at least another 8-12 weeks
• Emma Mitchell – withdrew from Scotland squad and was substituted in Min 70, not fully fit but likely to be short term
• Jordan Nobbs – knee – waiting full assessment but could be long term.

Nevertheless we are top of the table and our stats are fantastic:-

Played – 8

Won – 8

Goals scored – 38

Goals Conceded – 4

Clean Sheets – 6

Leading Goalscorer – Vivianne Miedema 13 

For a comparison with he PL after 12 games Man City have scored 36 and conceded 5, Sergio Agüero is top scorer with 8.

Here is the full table

	Club	P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts
1	Arsenal	8	8	0	0	38	4	34	24
2	Man City	8	5	3	0	26	6	20	18
3	Chelsea	9	4	4	1	10	5	5	16
4	Birmingham	8	5	1	2	10	6	4	16
5	Reading	8	4	2	2	13	9	4	14
6	Bristol City	8	3	2	3	7	12	-5	11
7	Liverpool	8	3	0	5	5	13	-8	9
8	West Ham	8	2	1	5	8	19	-11	7
9	Brighton	8	1	1	6	6	19	-13	4
10	Yeovil	8	1	0	7	5	24	-19	3
11	Everton	7	0	2	5	4	15	-11	2

Everton remain in bottom place and are the only team without a win, they do however have a game in hand having had their match away at Bristol postponed from 30 September to 24 March next year.

In the other matches this last weekend :-

Bristol beat Liverpool 2 – 1in the only game to be played on Saturday,all the goals coming in the first half

Chelsea v Yeovil – Chelsea found their scoring boots winning 5 – 0 against Yeovil who had a player sent off in the 40th minute when the score was already 2 – 0.  Chelsea are now third in the table but have yet to sit out a week so could well fall back again.

Brighton v Reading – Brighton were outplayed by Reading in a dominant second half who took a 1 – 0 lead at half time and really built on it.  Not the best preparation for our next opponents.

Birmingham v West Ham  Birmingham showed that they were a tough team to beat in their previous match where we struggled to break them down.  In this game they were too strong for league newcomers West Ham and came out 3 – 0 winners

Man City sat out this week as the 11th team 

Our next game is this coming Sunday against Brighton at Elstree and Borehamwood again with a 12:30pm  kickoff.  Tickets are available online at £6 and £3 concessions or on the gate at £10 and £5.

If you can’t get to the game then it will be on the BBC Red Button again but you really should try to go as then you don’t have to listen to someone else’s commentary.

COYWG