If I rewound back to the start of the season I may have not imagined that I’d come away from a match saying “that was three points dropped” because that’s what happened to us here.
We should have won and how we didn’t will remain something of a mystery to me. We created chance after chance after chance, but were guilty of squandering some golden opportunities and missing some absolute sitters. And we were made to pay the price for it.
Ascot didn’t really do anything different from the last time we played them, which was a game we won 11:2. They held a very high defensive line and that’s something we know how to deal with and usually exploit very well.
But not this time. We didn’t adapt quickly enough and allowed the game to be played in a very congested space in the middle of the park. That led to many more opportunities for tackles and created a situation where we really needed to rely on a good first-touch to get the ball under control. But we didn’t have that quality about us on the day and meant we didn’t deliver the type of telling passes that we normally can.
On top of that, the amount of times we were genuinely caught offside was absolutely criminal and downright silly. I spoke at length to the players about this both before kick-off and at half-time, so I was disappointed that they didn’t recognise the importance or heed this warning.
Had we shown a bit more care, intelligence and desire here, we would have created even more clear-cut chances. Instead, we gave away cheap free-kick after free-kick and conceded possession in the process and that prevented us from getting into our stride and rhythm, which ultimately frustrated us.
With all those things combined, it simply meant there was an air of desperation about the way we attacked. We lost our composure and focus in the final third and our finishing was sloppy as a result.
Over the past couple of weeks I spoke to the players about being ruthless and showing no mercy to any of their opponents. They’d won 10:1 last week and found it difficult to get going against inferior opposition.
Ascot had at best, two half-chances in the second-half and scored both with two great finishes to take the points. In contrast, we had dozens of efforts, including many one-on-ones that we didn’t put away. Sure, they had to hang on desperately and had some huge slices of luck along the way – but they showed a ruthlessness at the other end that we are looking for from our players.
Overall we didn’t pass the ball as well as we normally can, but we had the lion’s share of the play and we did create many opportunities. I thought we were the better of the two teams and that part is pleasing. And sometimes you can just have those days where you miss shots that you should be scoring. It happens.
Perhaps in hindsight we should have instructed our defence to play a little deeper to give us the space we needed so that we could have a chance to deliver with the quality we know we can. But we never really got the weight of our passes right on the day.
I was pleased with the amount of headers we won although somewhat disappointed by the amount we let bounce and shirked out of, which is not like us. I also felt we had too many players ball watching at times, but that’s something we’ll have to work on and address on the training ground.
Despite how the match panned out and the loss, we have still come an awful long way in a shot space of time this season and we’ve learned some very valuable lessons from this one.
The irony is we’re a much better team now than when we beat Ascot 11:2, but we’re still a very young side and sometimes inexperience and naivety will rear its head and play its part as it did here. We’re not the finished article and we have no divine right to believe that we are or that we will blast teams out of sight every week.
Nevertheless, I’m still confident that if we work hard both in training and matches, and that we show the necessary patience and belief, then we’ll continue to move in the right direction and will win more than we lose.
Team: Slyvia Williams, Alex Lupano, Nkechi Chukwueke, Melanie Randall, Amber Luzar, Natalie Worster (Vicky James), Kylie Worster (Sam Black), Scarlett Hanharan, Jade Bowley, Chloe Julien and Allana Ashmeil
Subs: Vicky James and Sam Black
Goals: Julien
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