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Jocelyn Prêcheur has lift-off in England.
Prêcheur, London City Lionesses' first landmark addition of the summer, joined the Pride from Paris Saint-Germain with clear principles and objectives.
Driven by an appreciation of football's finer details and a commitment to leading by example, Prêcheur left Ewood Park with a smile on his face on Sunday [15 September].
Lucy Fitzgerald and Chantelle Boye-Hlorkah had just fired his side to a 2-1 victory over Blackburn Rovers, improving London City's record on the season to 1-1-0.
The Frenchman spoke exclusively to londoncitylionesses.com after the match; here is every word he said.
Jocelyn, your first win as London City Lionesses head coach – what did you make of the performance?
We’re very satisfied with the three points and there were no injured players, so the job is done. Overall, we played pretty well, it was exactly the match we expected when we analysed Blackburn.
However, we can’t ignore our lack of efficiency – we could have killed this game sooner and had a more comfortable second half, but – on the other hand – we showed a positive state of mind and didn’t collapse when they scored. It was the opposite – we came back to the possession and controlled the game.
There were many chances for us to score the third goal, it was not the perfect performance, but we’re satisfied with three points and no injuries. Now, we can focus on how we recover and prepare for Bristol City next week.
Lucy Fitzgerald and Grace Neville came into the starting eleven this week, how did you rate their impact?
They both played very well.
I have the chance to pick between two players on the right wing – two interesting options, with different profiles. It’s always good to have that choice as a coach and I’m happy with Grace’s performance today.
Fitzy was very good in preseason – she’s very serious and it’s difficult to find a harder worker than her. Today, she made a lot of effort and scored the first goal, so it’s great.
They need to keep going. It’s my job to help them improve, as it is with the whole team, but they are fully involved in the project. If we want to be successful, we need to build a strong group. I didn’t have any doubts about it – Fitzy and Grace proved they are ready to help the team.
Teyah Goldie, Corinne Henson, and Georgia Brougham started in defence for the second week in a row – are they coming together well?
After the injuries to Maria [Perez] and Megan [Campbell], we needed to reorganise our defence a little, playing with two very young players. Now, they are starting to create some familiarity.
Individually speaking, they will become better and better as they develop self-confidence. Collectively, they understood exactly how I wanted them to defend. Today, their job was to defend the deep spaces and they did that pretty well except one time.
As I said before, they played very well and they are improving. We’re far from being perfect, but I thought, defensively, our performance was very interesting.
London City Lionesses return to Hayes Lane next Sunday [22 September], hosting Bristol City in the Barclays Women's Championship. Don't miss it.
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