Lisa Evans says that West Ham United Women need to turn their recent form around when they head into the four remaining matches of the Barclays Women’s Super League season.
The Hammers fell to a 6-2 defeat at the hands of Manchester City on Sunday evening and were punished by the home side in the early stages, with Chloe Kelly scoring twice in the opening ten minutes of the contest.
Emma Snerle was able bend in her first goal of the season to get the Hammers back in the contest, but Laura Coombs restored City’s two goal lead midway through the first half.
Second half goals from Khadija Shaw and Steph Houghton were followed by an effort from Lisa Evans, which Kheira Keating couldn't keep out, before Mary Fowler scored a sixth for the hosts.
It was a tough evening for the Hammers, and Evans believes that going two goals down early on made it incredibly difficult for the team to get anything from the game.
“When you go two goals down that early, you’re making it really difficult to get back into the game,” she told Sky Sports.
"We were aggressive and we did get after them, but to a certain extent we feel as though we still could have been more aggressive. I think we stood off them a little bit too much and could have got stuck in more.
"At times, we had some really good passages of play at times, but not for long enough periods in the game and that has cost us. You can’t give two early goals away against a team like Manchester City and expect to come away with points.”
When Denmark international Snerle notched her first goal of the season, it looked as though it would give the Hammers the impetus to go on and get another.
However, it wasn’t the case, as Coombs the home sides two goal advantage, and Evans agreed that the Citizens were ruthless.
“The goal gave us a lot of confidence, without a doubt! We know that we’re capable of scoring goals against anyone with the players that we have, it’s just taking the chances when they come along that we have found difficult in this half of the season.
“But like I said, it’s difficult when you’re up against the top teams in this division and they will punish you when we make mistakes. We made some tonight and they were clinical. We need to go back to the drawing board and make sure that we’re ready to pick up points in the final four matches of the season.”
The Hammers face Brighton & Hove Albion, Leicester City and Tottenham Hotspur in their final four matches, with all three currently sitting below them in the WSL standings.
It presents Evans and her teammates with a chance to distance themselves from those below, whilst also making sure they finish the 2022/23 campaign in the best possible way.
“I think we have to be prepared for those teams in and around us to pick up points, they’re fighting for their lives to not be the one team to go down so it’s not going to be easy for us.
“We’ve not won a WSL match in 2023, which we need to change in these final four matches – we know that it’s not good enough and we need to fix it.
“We had a really good start to the season, and we’ve not been able to sustain that. We want get back to how we were before Christmas and finish the season strongly,” Evans concluded.
