Beard Report: "Every Single Team Will Punish You If You Don't Stay Switched On"

Today at 04:00 PM

The Women's manager looks ahead to visiting West Ham in the Super League and reflects on the opener against Leicester.

Draws are always disappointing, but the beauty of the football season is that there's another chance in the following week to set things right. Liverpool Women opened their season against Leicester City Women, ending in a 1-1 draw, but travel to West Ham this weekend to hopefully get the three points they need to survive this league.

"While it was frustrating we couldn't get the win last weekend, I thought we created enough chances to take all three points," Liverpool Women manager Matt Beard wrote in his weekly column.

"I thought we started the game really well and we were comfortable. But when it got too comfortable, I think we got a bit complacent. We spoke about that at half-time with the players about dropping standards. It's difficult when you come up against a side who defended how they did and the way they set the block up was good.

"I felt we broke that well at times but sometimes we have to just be a bit patient with it – move the ball around to get them to be drawn out. When we did that, we saw spaces appear.

"We could have been out of sight at half-time. Marie [Höbinger] had a great chance, Paz [Lucy Parry] had a great chance, Olivia Smith had a few opportunities when she could have had a shot."

Liverpool had gone into the break leading by that one goal, but Leicester City pounced on a moment of distraction for the Reds and leveled the scoreboard just after the start of the second half. Every moment of weakness will be exploited in this league, and the manager says the Red Women should know that too.

"I was disappointed with the goal we conceded. The goal reminded me of the goal Chelsea scored against us last season from a throw-in where we had a breather and switched off," Beard continued.

"Every single team will punish you in those situations if you don't stay switched on. The top teams punish you and now everyone has strengthened their sides, you can't switch off in those moments. It is a learning curve for us as a team to make sure it doesn't happen again.

"It's disappointing not to win the game but, like I always say, if you can't win then you need to make sure you get a point. From my end, I feel it's one of those situations where it is two points dropped. But we've got to make sure we draw on the positives – some of our good play and the good chances we created and focus on converting those chances.

"It's game one. There's still 21 games to go and we focus on the positives and be patient."

The league opener was also the chance to give some of our new summer signings a run out, with Gemma Evans and Olivia Smith named to the starting lineup, and Cornelia Kapocs on the bench. Smith missed a number of preseason preparations due to the U20 Women's World Cup, but made quite the impression in her first start.

"[Olivia] Smithy had a good debut for us. She is a good player, she is intelligent and she is so strong. I don't think many centre-halves are going to like coming up against her because of how strong she is," the manager added.

"She was nervous before the game. She didn't have the opportunity to play against Everton the weekend before because she was only just back from the U20 World Cup with Canada, so she missed a lot of tactical work we've been doing with the 3-5-2.

"She is still finding her feet, like Gemma Evans and Kappy [Cornelia Kapocs] are still finding their feet. They came into the squad late and then we lost Smithy for three to four weeks due to the World Cup. There's a few teething problems we've got.

"I thought for the most part Gemma defended really well. She needs to learn the patterns and some of the forward play for us, which is going to take a little bit of time. When we brought her in, she played left-back and left wing-back when Taylor [Hinds] and Jas [Matthews] were injured in pre-season.

"I'm pleased with where we are but we are a few weeks behind where I would like us to be."

The next test ahead is traveling to West Ham on Sunday and while they have had all week to work out some of the concerns from the past weekend, Beard is mindful that it'll be a tough match.

"We've got a big week ahead now to make sure we get the little wrongs right on the pitch and it's never easy going to play West Ham away. But we are confident we can get something out of the game on Sunday.

"West Ham have made a lot of changes during the summer. It's going to be a tough game and they will be looking to respond after losing to Manchester United."

Liverpool Women play on Sunday, with kick-off at 3pm BST at Chigwell Construction Stadium, and streamed on YouTube at the Barclay's WSL channel.