Lisa Evans believes that West Ham United women’s team are growing in confidence under manager Rehanne Skinner.
The midfielder played her part in the team’s first victory of the 2023/24 season, as they beat Brighton & Hove Albion 2-0 on Sunday afternoon at Broadfield Stadium – with Evans assisting Riko Ueki for her first goal in Claret & Blue.
Skinner’s side put in a performance that saw them show determination, energy and a high level of skill against the Seagulls, as they worked tirelessly to get themselves ahead, and then keep a clean sheet, which was earned by everyone out on the pitch.
And Evans reflected on a positive afternoon’s work at the full-time whistle.
“I thought we dominated for large portions of the game,” she told whufc.com. “We took a lot of confidence from the game against Manchester City last week, where I thought we played well at times, so it was nice to bring that into the game today and come away with the victory.
“We forced them into mistakes and was relentless with our closing down and created a lot of opportunities, and really, should have scored a couple more.
“This is a good starting point for us, and with more games coming up, hopefully this momentum for the victory will help heading into that run of games.”
Evans’ compatriot, Kirsty Smith opened the scoring in West Sussex after only 12 minutes, with the defender also having an opportunity before that which she couldn’t convert.
Smith and her opposite wing-back Anouk Denton were both full of running through the game, and Evans praised the hard working performance of the team post-match.
“It’s testament to Kirsty that she was that high up the pitch in the first place, it shows how positive we are playing as a team. I think we can exploit teams with our willingness to run and to get into those spaces.
“And for Riko’s goal, it’s some header! She does all of the work in getting her head onto the ball. That gave us a really good platform for the rest of the game, and we know that we have the quality to grind out results if we stick to our gameplan.
“I think every player on the pitch gave it everything they had, and that’s exactly what we need to do in every game we have moving forwards.”
The Hammers battled for superiority against Melissa Phillips' Brighton, who began their campaign with a 2-1 win over Everton on the opening weekend of the new Barclays Women's Super League season.
But Evans and her teammates came out on top, playing the way that new boss Skinner wants the team to play, by taking risks, being patient and as a result, creating plenty of chances.
"I think it’s really important for us to know that we can take risks and make mistakes with the way that we’re trying to play. We made mistakes against Manchester City and then we stopped doing what we wanted to do with the ball.
"So I think it’s a case of if we do feel like we’re under pressure, we need to keep going and trying to play. Being brave with our play is going to give us success this season, and I think you saw that against Brighton.
"We’ve got to take that into the games this week now, and we want to get our Conti Cup campaign off to a good start on Wednesday night."
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