Rehanne: “The pressing was much better”

Tottenham Hotspur Women Head Coach Rehanne Skinner was delighted with her side’s desire to win the ball back in Sunday’s 2-1 win away to Reading.

“I’m delighted that we won the game and that’s the most important thing today,” she said. “The pressing intent was much better than last week. All week the training sessions in preparation for this game have been so much better, so I’m really pleased we transferred that into the game.”

Ashleigh Neville gave Spurs the lead with a smart opening goal, cutting in from the right wing onto her left foot and firing into the far corner.

“Ash created the opportunity for herself by cutting inside and creating a goalscoring chance,” Rehanne said. 

“Collectively, as a team, we found ways to penetrate their backline quite frequently. Cho made some fantastic runs in the first half that actually opened up the game a lot for us and if we can be a little bit sharper on the drop downs for things to be able to capitalise on more of those, but it’s a huge step forward from last week and that’s the most important thing.

“In terms of spotting opportunities to break that line, even when you’re playing against the back five, there are ways through if you get the timing of movement right and we got the opportunities. Becky had a fantastic game today as well across the board, so it’s quite fitting that she’s looking to penetrate passes and get us into really good goalscoring opportunities.

“Cho created a lot of opportunity with great footwork to make life difficult for the Reading defenders. Nikola was on hand, when we hadn’t scored the first one, which arguably we could have, to get the second one through her being quicker to respond. That’s why she’s here with lots of other elements to her game. She is a goalscorer and we’ll see that more and more as time goes on.”

Despite Spurs successfully winning the ball back from Reading on a number of occasions, Rehanne still felt there was room for improvement in the midfield.

“We could’ve been better actually in the first half because I don’t think we were dealing with the player that was sitting in the pocket behind our midfield well enough in the first 10 or 15 minutes,” she said.

“Once we resolved that, we just managed what Ev and Haz were doing a bit better, that then nullifies a lot of what they got in terms of transitions from that area. 

“We do need to be a little bit more alert to those players and communicate that more effectively, but once we did that, we did manage the midfield really well, but we just want to keep working on improving that as time goes on.”

Kyah Simon unfortunately had to be stretchered off of the pitch with an injury late on, and here’s what Rehanne had to say on the matter:

“My view was a little bit obscured by the player who was in front of her when it happened. It looked like she took an impact. I’m not 100 percent sure on the outcome right now. The player slipped and she made contact so between the two of them, it’s created a bit of a difficult situation to get yourself out of. Hopefully it’s nothing serious.”

As for our plans going forward, Rehanne will get the players who aren’t going away for international duty training and preparing for Liverpool as usual.

“We’re going to keep working as we normally do. The next game is Liverpool. We obviously want to reflect on this one and make sure we take the positives and things we want to work on, and then we’ll put them into practice. 

“We’re looking forward to playing our first game at Leyton Orient and that’s somewhere we want to make our fortress moving forward. We’ll be planning for the next game as much as we do for every game. 

“For the internationals going away, we always want them to do really well. Haz is going away with Wales in this October trip and that’s a massive game for them to try to qualify for the World Cup, which we wish them all the best for.”