Hello, Arsenal Women aficionados!
Arsenal Women had to win, and they won. After a three-games winless run in the WSL that saw the team fall to fifth, our girls overcame a valiant Brighton at the Emirates Stadium and got back on track, although they are still sitting in fifth place in the table.
Tottenham Hotspur’s narrow loss to Chelsea at Kingsmeadow means that we are much closer to the top four, but all of Chelsea, Manchester City and Manchester United won during the weekend and managed to stay clear of the Gunners.
It took an own goal and a wonderful save from Daphne van Domselaar to see off Brighton, who were playing without Michelle Agyemang and Rosa Kafaji, but the result really was the only thing that mattered on Sunday.
The WSL now goes on a break to allow internationals to reach their national teams and will return on November 2nd, when we will face Leicester at the King Power Stadium.
I feel that this break comes at the perfect time, for a change, and hopefully will allow our players to reset, because very few expected the first weeks of the season to be so hard. Before that, though, we will face Benfica in Lisbon, on Thursday night, with the same objective that we had against Brighton: win.
After losing to OL Lyonnes, we need to get back on the right track in the UWCL too, or our European campaign might derail too soon, too hard.
As a reminder, only the top four teams will get into the quarterfinals and both Barcelona and OL Lyonnes seem to have booked the first two spots, so every point will count between now and mid-December.
SAVE OF THE SEASON FOR DAPHNE
When Spanish striker Camacho sent her header across the goal, it looked like Brighton finally had their well-deserved equalizer. Daphne van Domselaar had a different opinion, though.
With a stunning dive to her right and an outstretched arm, she tipped the ball over the post, to the disbelief of Brighton players and everyone else’s relief.
That would remain the last chance crafted by Brighton, with the Gunners taking over in midfield and creating a string of chances for themselves.
Games are often decided in the penalty areas, and Daphne van Domselaar proved exactly why, on Sunday.
After a few errors too many, the former Aston Villa shot stopper produced a fine performance between the sticks and proved unbeatable for Brighton, who had several good chances shut down by the Dutch.
Hopefully this will be like a new dawn for Daphne, and she will come back from the break full of confidence after a rather shaky start of the season.
OH, STINA!
When she got on against Brighton, Stina Blackstenius immediately injected energy and purpose into an otherwise tiring, stagnating attack. With her running and off-the-ball movement, she created lots of issues to the visitors’ defensive line and had four decent chances to put the game to bed.
Yet…
Once again, the Sweden international lacked the killer instinct in the box and squandered them all.
Sure, she was very unlucky when her header hit the crossbar, but she should have done better with the remaining chances, especially deep in stoppage time, when she flashed her shot across the goal and wide of the far post from a few yards out.
The team needs her to put away those chances, especially when the scoreline is tight and time is running out: once again, we had to work excessively hard to bring home the three points, and we were one episode away from a West Ham 2.0 – which would have been catastrophic.
There is just so much one can praise about movement, effort, running the channels of offering an easy route to ease the pressure, if those do not end with goals. Stina Blackstenius remains a fantastic striker and a great asset for the team, but she must become more cynical and start showing some end-product to go with her obvious qualities.
Manchester City have Vivienne Miedema and Khadija Shaw and Chelsea have Sam Kerr and Angie Beever-Jones (and Mayra Ramirez), so we need a pair of excellent strikers to make sure we maximize our chances to stay within touching distance from the leaders.
Can Stina Blackstenius reach a new level?
MORE OF KCC, PLEASE
Over the last few months, Kyra Cooney-Cross was the talk of the summer: the promising youngster ready to step-up; the outstanding talent ready to take the mantle from Lia Wälti; the understudy finally allowed to take the reins from Kim Little.
Then, she disappeared.
As soon as the official games came by, the Australian drifted away from the starting XI and got a total of 26 minutes (!) under her name across the WSL and the UWCL, while Mariona Caldentey and Kim Little clocked over 400 minutes in the WSL and started against OL Lyonnes in Europe.
Against Brighton, Kyra Cooney-Cross finally had a chance to play meaningful minutes and reminded everyone about her qualities and skills.
With the team struggling to build any sort of momentum against a disciplined, vaguely irritating Brighton side, she started popping up across the pitch, driving forward with the ball and taking advantage of tired legs around her.
All of a sudden, we were on top again and started producing good chances, while Brighton dropped deeper in their half and basically stopped threatening Daphne van Domselaar.
Much of that is due to the energy and poise KCC brough onto the pitch, and her ability to break the lines with incisive passes or smart runs.
While the international break seems to arrive at a very good moment for the team as a whole, it might be ill-timed for Kyra Cooney-Cross, who could have built on her impressive cameo. Hopefully she will play her part against Benfica, in midweek, to make a mark on Renée Slegers and the staff
NEXT UP
Arsenal Women will be back to Lisbon, on Thursday, but won’t be playing at the Estádio José Alvalade, where they lifted the UWCL trophy.
Instead, they will be facing Benfica at the Estadio Da Luz, on the red side of town.
Benfica lost away to Juventus in the first round, with defender Salvai scoring twice after the visitors opened the score, so will need a win as much as we do.
We can expect a tense affair in Portugal, a close game between two teams that simply cannot afford to lose again.
We will talk again after the game, as usual.
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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