Rosella Ayane: "London derbies are always special"

Ahead of tonight’s London derby under the lights at Kingsmeadow, forward Rosella Ayane says that Spurs Women have “pleasantly surprised” onlookers with our performances so far this season.

Having suffered a narrow 1-0 defeat to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in the opening game of the season, we have since secured impressive wins against Liverpool, West Ham at the London Stadium and Bristol City in the Barclays FA Women’s Super League (WSL) which positions us sixth in the table, level on points with Manchester United.

Our Continental League Cup clash with Emma Hayes’ Chelsea this evening follows on from our 2-0 defeat on Sunday against Arsenal at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Despite the loss, it was yet another performance this season where our rivals struggled to break us down for long periods of the game and we walked away from the match with the feeling that we deserved more, just as we did against Chelsea on our WSL debut.

The Blues, who are unbeaten so far this season, are top of Conti Cup Group D and we are third in the group, behind Reading who play Crystal Palace tomorrow evening - the top two clubs from each group progress to the knockout stages.

Former Chelsea player Rosella said: “I think London derbies are always extra special occasions, and they’re really exciting games to be involved in as a player and we know the fans are always hyped up for them too.

“The opening day at Stamford Bridge against one of the best teams in England, some people expected us to lose heavily, so to come away from that game with a narrow 1-0 defeat shows that we’re not pushovers and we’ve only got stronger since then and hopefully that will show.

“I think we’ve pleasantly surprised a lot of people, of course we are a new team and we have just come into this division so I think people didn’t really know what to expect from us, but I think we’ve proved some people wrong and showed that we really can compete at this level.

“I think the game tonight will be exciting, we know Chelsea have a big fan base and I’m sure Kingsmeadow will be packed and will be a good atmosphere for us to play in and for me personally, it’s always exciting to go back to your former Club and show them how much you’ve come on.”

This week sees us play three matches in seven days, but Rosella believes the squad is well equipped to handle the busy schedule.

“We’ve got a large and competitive squad so we’re fortunate that we can rotate during this busy week but it’s also good in the sense that players can really compete for their place in the starting line-up and it makes us a competitive bunch,” Rosella continued. “Having three games in a week is tough for any team so we’ll just embrace it and take each game as it comes. I think everyone involved in the day on Sunday put 100 per cent in, whether we were starting the game, on the bench or not in the squad, it was a big team effort so hopefully we can take that team spirit into the game tonight against Chelsea.”