Ahead of West Ham United women's team's Barclays Women's Super League fixture against Bristol City, Rehanne Skinner penned her Official Programme notes! You can read them below!
Good afternoon and welcome to Chigwell Construction Stadium for today’s Barclays Women’s Super League match against Bristol City.
I'd like to wish Lauren Smith, her staff and players a warm welcome to east London for today's fixture.
It’s nice to be back in league action today after the international break and we’re hoping to continue with the positives that we’ve shown in our opening five fixtures so far.
The international break is always a challenge for us because we have around half of the squad away representing their countries. That’s great to have internationals playing on the biggest stage, but it does impact the time we have as a group to prepare for the fixtures that comes immediately after the break.
For the players that stayed behind with us at Chadwell Heath, we’ve been able to work on more individualised bits which we think will help them in the long run. We’re heading into the next run of fixtures in a really good place, ready to build on the performances that we’ve produced so far.
We keep players match fit & ready with behind closed doors friendlies in the break which helps keep everyone in the same place. This week, the attitude and desire has been excellent, gearing up ready for the weekend.
Last time out at home against Liverpool, we didn’t start as well as we would have liked. I changed a couple of things at half time because I felt like we could have been more aggressive in terms of the way that we pressed.
We fought to the very end, and the last 20 minutes was our best spell in the game. We had finishers coming onto the pitch that really made an impact, and players were doing everything to make sure that we got that ball over the line to get back into the game.
Every single player and staff in the dugout were on the pitch when Riko scored, which sums up the passion that we have at the Club and how important it was to get back into the game and come away with a point.
Having played Bristol City in pre-season, plus with the work that we’ve been able to do analysing their recent performances, we have a pretty good idea of what today’s game will be like. We know it’s going to be tough, first and foremost, because every game in this league is. We also know that if we continue with the positive aspects that we’ve shown in our recent matches, then we can come away with the three points at the end of the game.
Your support so far has been fantastic. I said on Iron Cast earlier in the week that I’ve loved having the support and the passion of the fans behind us. It’s incredibly helpful to have such positive support behind us and having that constant noise is a massive boost to the players out on the pitch.
COME ON YOU IRONS!
Rehanne
