London City Lionesses endured an afternoon to forget on Sunday [12 November], falling to a one-goal loss against Birmingham City at Princes Park.
Speaking after the match, head coach Carolina Morace offered her thoughts on the team's performance, the red card issued to Emma Mukandi, and the need to reset ahead of next weekend's trip to Lewes.
After a frustrating day at the office, what are your key takeaways from today's match?
That was a bad performance for us from the beginning. We weren’t able to keep the ball possession and it looked like we were panicking when we had the ball. When we didn’t have the ball, we were too far away from the opponent to press in a productive way. In the last five minutes I saw something different but the red card for [Emma Mukandi] meant the match was finished.
Emma Mukandi was dismissed in the final minutes of play, what is your view of the incident?
We need to be more responsible. We know that they are an aggressive team but we cannot react to the fouls they commit. We have a lot of chances to give back what we received [in terms of physical play], but it is not acceptable to react in that way.
Paige Satchell had a big chance in the first-half, do you see the positives in the fact that the team created those opportunities to score?
Today, I cannot say that we created a lot of chances. Yes, the one with Paige was clear because she was exactly in front of the ‘keeper - but sometimes you score and sometimes you don’t. We need to create more chances in future games.
Ruesha Littlejohn returned from injury this afternoon, how much will that boost the team?
Immediately you can see that her experience helped the team. She knows what she is doing in her role, so it is very important for us to have her back.
Looking ahead to Lewes, will you need to lift the mood of the group?
We need to restart. What I don’t like is that today’s performance was one step back from the previous two games. I don’t like to start again from the beginning all the time, I like to start when we arrive and progress from there. In training we have to look through the game and learn from our mistakes. We need to be more aware of what we desire and focus more. We cannot lose or waste chances like we did today.
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