A new era is beginning for West Ham United Women.
Rehanne Skinner is at the helm, becoming the first female coach of the Club in the professional era, and she was delighted to be on the grass with the team for the first time on Tuesday afternoon.
Skinner was appointed manager on 20 July 2023, but had prior media commitments out at the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup which saw her providing commentary for the world feed.
After commentating on some fantastic matches in Australia, Skinner was also able to use her time to work remotely with staff back at Chadwell Heath as her side returned for pre-season at the end of July.
Now though, she is back in England, working with the squad for the first time as they prepare for the upcoming campaign.
After the session, Skinner spoke with West Ham TV about getting down to work, recruitment and their upcoming pre-season friendly match against Lewes on Sunday.
Rehanne, welcome back to Chadwell Heath! You’ve just taken your first session with the players out on the grass, how was that?
To be honest, I've been desperate to get on the pitch, it feels like it's been quite a while to be able to get out here and work with the players.
They've been fantastic today, really energetic, and it's just been really good to get on the grass and work with everybody for the first time.
You’ve been out in Australia conducting media commitments that you had, how was that experience?
Yeah, it was fantastic. I think the World Cup out there, the way that Australia and New Zealand have promoted the World Cup has been fantastic for the two nations.
There was a huge buzz and over 40,000 fans at nearly every game that I covered in Australia. So yeah, it's been fantastic experience and just a really good advert for the game.
We had some of the big hitters knocked out early on, and some of the underdogs, so to speak, that have progressed really well since the last World Cup. So it's been great for the game overall.
You just hope that it will help to grow the game off the back of the tournament, and I certainly believe that it will.
Your main job out there was the commentary, but you’ve also had one eye on the talent that was on show. In terms of recruitment, have you got any irons in the fire that you’re working towards bringing in?
It's that time of year, isn't it? We've been in a lot of conversations back here and conversations with agents and players - that's all been going on whilst I've been out in Australia.
We want to try and strengthen the squad, and every window is going to be a really important opportunity to do that. There’s been some standout players in the tournament as well, which has been superb. So yeah, it's looking really positive moving forward.
How nice was it to be able to be back here working with the players on the grass today after lots of remote working over the last couple of weeks?
To be honest, the place that I love to be is on the grass, so it's been great working with everybody today.
I've been able to touch base with everybody from afar in and around the time difference and I've spoken to our players that have been competing in the World Cup. I've managed to speak to everybody, which is great, albeit from a distance.
But today, it was just really good to get everybody on the grass and just getting to know people a little bit better. It's just such a huge part of any football club is building those relationships.
We've had a good session today. It was fun and lively. And obviously that's a good start for us.
We face Lewes this weekend, so what kind of things will you be working towards with the team this week?
It’s going to be our second game of pre-season, and it’s important that we start building up those minutes. The physical outcomes are really important at this stage of pre-season and we've also started to implement some of the principles of play that we want to work towards.
it's important this week with me being here that we carry on developing that, and obviously just putting some things in practice that are going to help the team to play the style of football we want to play come the start of the season.
Want to watch Rehanne Skinner's West Ham United in action throughout the 2023/24 Barclays Women's Super League season? Purchase a season ticket by clicking on the graphic below!
