Hello, Arsenal Women aficionados!
What a start for our new permanent coach! We had to wait three whole months to finally land our main target, but it was definitely worth the wait, wasn’t it? The club took its time and Renée Slegers held the fort outstandingly while the recruitment process was conducted, but we finally got who we truly wanted. Hallelujah, brothers and sisters!
Fine, I stop. Renée Slegers was appointed as our permanent manager on Friday, and 48 hours later her team demolished rock-bottom Crystal Palace with a 5-0 home win at Meadow Park, although the visitors made our players work harder than anyone would have expected, to be fair. Goals from Leah Williamson, Alessia Russo and Beth Mead, plus a brace from Mariona Caldentey, allowed us to overtake Manchester City, who lost the derby at home, in second and keep Manchester United behind on goal difference.

Photo courtesy of Arsenal.com
Chelsea, who thumped West Ham 5-0 away from home, remain six points clear at the top, but the mood changed so much since Renée Slegers took over that we can be considered as legitimate challengers to Sonia Bompastor’s relentless winning machine.

Photo courtesy of Arsenal.com
In other news, Vivienne Lia signed for Southampton on loan shortly after putting pen to paper to her first professional contract, and Kathrine Kühl left permanently but joined AS Roma in Italy and not Everton, as widely expected. Will the club recruit an additional player to palliate for the Danmark international’s departure? Maybe, although the club might not go for a role-per-role replacement but go for an extra forward, instead.
RENÉE’S WORDS
Renée Slegers was obviously very happy with the result and the performance, although she conceded that it took time for the team to find their rhythm:
“If you look at the performance, I think you see that we haven’t played a game for a month. Our last game was here at Borehamwood against Bayern, and you could see that in the first half. We didn’t really find the connection or those perfect timings and the quality on the ball, but we still get the 1-0 from a set-piece. We’ve been scoring more from set-pieces, which is positive as well.“ Then, speaking about the supporters, she apologized (!) for the first-half display: “Sorry for the first half, we had to try and get it right, but I think hopefully the second half we brought some good football and some goals.”
You did, Renée. Stay assured that Meadow Park was jubilant by full-time, and everyone forgot about the cold.
Going back to the interview she gave while unveiled as our new permanent manager, Renée Slegers sat down with club legend Ian Wright and delivered some important lines about ambition and direction:
“We want to win things with the team and that’s also why I’m here because I believe we can with this team. There’s a lot of work behind it and good performances as well because I understand what our football and the team mean to a lot of people. We really want to deliver something beautiful that’s inspiring and that leads to trophies. […] “It’s going to be very important for me that nothing changes because I think what’s made us so strong is the collective ownership. So I won’t change, the girls shouldn’t change, no-one should change because we do things really well at the moment.”
LESSON LEARNED
Having a winter break is great, but having a prolonged winter break can do more harm than good. The first half performance provided lots of evidence about this, and Renée Slegers was prompt to underline it during her post-match interview.
Our passing was erratic, off-the-ball movements were not in-synch for most part of the initial 45 minutes, and Crystal Palace found acres of spaces in our final third, something very unusual since the former Jonas Eidevall assistant coach took over. The visitors spurned some golden chances that might have transformed a routine win into a more complicated one, or worse.
With Chelsea and Manchester City coming up in successive league games, both away from home, we cannot allow either one the same space and time we gave Gejl and Cato or we will be punished severely and will find ourselves with a mountain to climb.
Now that Renée Slegers seems to have found the much-needed stability with her starting XI, it should be easier for the players to click again, finetune their understanding and restrict opponents to low-quality chances. Speaking of stability, a recent piece (£) by Art de Roché for The Athletic highlighted how the coach only made two or more changes to her starting XI twice in her first initial 11 games in charge, which is a big change compared to Eidevall’s tenure: it might not be a magic winning formula, but it surely help building chemistry and understanding among the players.
The overall feeling is that we now have a team spine, clear and visible to everyone, around which Renée Slegers is building depending on form, opponents and calendar.
Such spine is built around Daphne van Domselaar, Emily Fox, Steph Catley, Leah Williamson, Katie McCabe, Mariona Caldentey and Alessia Russo. Other pieces are virtually untouchable, such as Frida Maanum and Caitlin Foord, but their roles might vary from one game to another.

Photo courtesy of Arsenal.com
As things look, Renée Slegers found her ideal back-five and won’t change unless she is forced too – which is always a wise move, since defenders need to play regularly together to improve as a unit – and seems to have chosen Alessia Russo as her focal point upfront, but things are less clear elsewhere on the pitch.
Mariona Caldentey is the cornerstone, so far, but her role triggers further changes on the pitch: if the former Barcelona star plays on the left-wing, then either one of Caitilin Foord or Beth Mead drops to the bench; if Mariona Caldentey plays more centrally, then Frida Maanum usually plays deeper and another midfielder (usually Kim Little) makes way in the starting XI, then the Norwegian is subbed-off in search of more control and solidity.

Photo courtesy of Arsenal.com
The interesting fact, in midfield, is that both of Kim Little and Lia Wälti are no longer automatic starters, for various reasons: the Swiss suffered a long-term injury that allowed Kyra Cooney-Cross to take her long-awaited chance to prove herself week in, week out, while the Scotland and Arsenal legend, who completed only 5 of her 13 starts in all competitions and started half of the games available in the WSL, seems to be the preferred options for UWCL games, where she started every game since the start of our European campaign.
It will be interesting to see who will make the spot hers between Lia Wälti and Kyra Cooney-Cross, but I suspect that the former Potsdam Turbine midfielder will return to starting XI sooner rather than later.
Something similar seems to happen upfront, where Alessia Russo determines who plays where but remains a mainstay in our starting XI: the England striker has restricted teammate and rival Stina Blackstenius to only four starts in all competitions, so far, and only one in the WSL. When she doesn’t play at center-forward, she is deployed at left-wing, which leaves the door open for Stina Blackstenius to remove the super-sub tag from her shirt and harass defenders with her relentless running in-behind and working the channels.
Such is the difference in style between Stina Blackstenius and Alessia Russo, that Renée Slegers hasn’t figured out how to play the two together without altering the whole team setup. As opposed to Jonas Eidevall, who tended to use square pegs in round holes to give both enough playing time, Renée Slegers made what looks like a final decision and, in doing so, gave the team a much clearer identity.
NEXT’S UP
No time to rest for the team, which is quite ironic given that we didn’t play in one entire month: next up is Brighton in the league cup, away from home. With four days between this game and the potentially season-defining away trip to Stamford Bridge, I suspect that Renée Slegers will rotate her players and give Lotte Wubben-Moy, Stina Blackstenius, Lia Wälti and others some important minutes, all while resting her main players.
Brighton is no easy feat, though, and winning at their place to defend our trophy will require lots of energy and concentration. Currently fifth in the league, they suffered a dip in form and results and dropped 11 points in their last 5 games, winning only one game, against West Ham.
Not good enough to break into the top four but too good to go down, Brighton might decide to go all-in in the domestic cups while big clubs are dealing with packed schedules and will have to make decisions about their priorities.
We will talk again after the weekend game at Chelsea, to check where we are at and how Renée’s unbeaten start survived these two massive away games.
Speak to you soon!

Italian living in Switzerland, Gooner since mid-nineties, when the Gunners defeated my hometown team, in Copenhagen. I started my own blog and podcast (www.clockenditalia.com) after after some experiences with Italian websites and football magazines. Covering Arsenal Women with the occasional rant about the boys.
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