QPR Ladies Reserves 1:1 Wycombe Wanderers Reserves
It took us a long time to get going in this match and I felt a bit sorry for the players about that because it wasn’t really their fault. Due to this being a midweek evening game and kicking off at the unusual time of 7:15pm, we had very little time to prepare properly and that showed in the first half hour.
But once we got going we put in another good performance, particularly in the second-half and came away slightly disappointed that we didn’t take all three points.
You learn a lot of lessons about preparation and in the future we need to make sure this is always spot on because in hindsight an early kick-off did not help us at all. We had players and staff arriving late from work or wherever they needed to come from and that meant we didn’t have a proper warm-up or time to organise and sort things out in the manner we would normally do.
I hope we won’t be making that mistake again because it’s not a good way to run a football team and it doesn’t matter if it’s the first game of the season or the last, it’s important to do things properly all the time and this frustrated me from the outset.
The things we didn’t do well in the first-half were only a result of our lack of preparation as we weren’t sharp out of the blocks and made some elementary mistakes. We were a little bit prone to congesting our own space again, as we did against Aylesbury, and it cost us a goal that we didn’t need to concede.
We were also guilty of ball watching in that period and not going in for challenges when we should have been and we had too many walking or flat-footed at times and not supporting one another. We spoke about that at half-time and the need to press the play as a unit and provide options and we did a much better job of it in the second-half.
I thought Wycombe were a tidy little team. They had height and pace and a nice combination of strength and technically gifted players, so they had a decent balance about them and were a good test for us in that sense.
We coped relatively well with their pace and their goal was really our own doing as we had wide players drifting in centrally and causing a bottleneck in the midfield area. That led us to losing possession in a dangerous area and they took advantage of that with a long-range strike that beat Jess Devoti from a good 20-25 yards. It was still a good shot mind but it was avoidable from our point of view.
The defensive performance of the team was pretty good actually but it was always on the borderline of high risk because our shape and positioning was lopsided and we were leaving gaping holes all over the place. It would have taken just one mistake, such as a missed tackle, a missed header, one missed pass or a simple slip and they would have been in and outnumbering us in and around the penalty box.
The problem stemmed from some basic situations. Kesleigh Danielle Long was too far forward on the right and not helping Jade Bowley enough at right-back, which led to Melanie Randall often coming out of the centre-back position to cover. Whenever Mel did come out Jade B didn’t tuck in behind her and therefore if we lost the ball, suddenly Amber Luzar was isolated and outnumbered in the middle.
Wycombe did not capitalise on this but at the same time, whenever Mel, Jade B or Amber were called upon to defend, they always managed to get in that last ditch challenge or mop up the mess, so the defending was pretty good even if it was high risk stuff.
As the half went on though we began to create some good moments in the attacking third and when we did decide to pass the ball around we opened them up beautifully but without the killer finish or decisive pass to create that golden chance. Instead we had a few nearly moments before finding an equaliser through the most unlikely source!
We won a free-kick around 45-yards out and Jess stepped up from her goal to fire home the most unimaginable equaliser ever. She struck the ball in under the crossbar and the Wycombe keeper unfortunately made a bit of a meal of it in the process and deflected the ball into the corner of the net, so we went in at the interval at one apiece.
I told the players at half-time that the only problems we had were the ones we created ourselves. All we needed to do was hold our shape a little better and ensure that the full-backs were being covered by their respective wingers rather than the centre-backs being dragged out of position and all over the place. I also expressed a need for the wingers to stay wide, especially when we had the ball.
So we decided to change things around and moved Vicky James into the centre of defence and Mel out to left-back and brought Kylie Worster over to the left of midfield too. Mel just loves a tackle anyway and we felt that would give her the opportunity to press her opponent whilst making sure we maintained a core shape centrally. Jade Creighton came on up top along with Anita Afonso in the midfield.
And in the second period I thought we created the better opportunities and had all of the dangerous moments without every really creating that one killer chance to score. I think had we managed to we would have taken it, but it didn’t come because we were a little bit naïve at times and made the wrong choices or decisions at the vital moment and scuppered our own good work accidentally.
Bar one strike from them, which produced a fantastic save from Jess, they weren’t nearly as threatening as in the first-half and I really liked the way our players always tried to find a way to win the game. We played some great knocks and through balls throughout the match and the introduction of Anita, Jade C and Allana Ashmeil in the second period definitely made a difference and allowed us to play with another style.
There were long periods in that final 45 minutes where it seemed like it was one way traffic with us building momentum and looking for a way to penetrate their defence. But you could see why they’ve got one of the better defensive records as they held their lines well and utilised the offside trap at good moments and have a mixture of strength, height, fitness and technical players at the back.
We haven’t actually passed the ball as well as we did back in the months of January and February but we are still a right handful. In this game we were almost trying to bulldoze our way to a win, which has worked for us at times in some matches this season.
Going forward I’d like to see us passing and moving with a little more intelligence, but I thought Jade Creighton’s strength and ability to hold up the ball in this match was excellent and she caused them many problems wherever she was on the pitch. It allowed us to penetrate and build up the play in the final third in a way that we didn’t in the first-half.
At the back, I was very pleased with all the defenders, particularly Amber and Vicky, who were very disciplined but also played with quality too and that’s exactly what we needed to gain control over the play. Amber has really put in some storming performances since she joined and proved that even with a sore foot she was determined to stay on the pitch and see the game out.
Overall I’m really pleased with the squad. I can clearly see that we’re making progress and in the past couple of games we’ve mixed and matched it a bit, more because we want to learn a little more about some of our players as well as giving others more minutes under their belts and am very pleased by what I’ve learned about certain combination of players.
We’ve also managed to do all of this and remain very competitive and that bodes well for the future. It’s becoming more difficult to work out what our best team or best eleven is and that’s a very nice problem to have and gives us a chance to play more dynamically when we need to and adapt to the different types of opposition out there.
After almost a season with this team and at this level, I believe I understand what’s required for the next campaign and with the correct preparation I think we’ve got an outstanding chance to go further.
Team: Jessica Devoti, Jade Bowley, Alex Lupano (Jade Creighton), Melanie Randall, Amber Luzar, Kesleigh Danielle Long (Allana Ashmeil), Natalie Worster (Anita Afonso), Vicky James, Scarlett Hanrahan, Kylie Worster, Chloe Julien
Subs: Jade Creighton, Allana Ashmeil, Anita Afonso
Goals: Devoti
