Renee Slegers spoke about a big win for her players at the Emirates Stadium on Sunday afternoon.
Arsenal put themselves in pole position to return to the Champions League final, winning 2-1 against OL Lyonnes to hold the advantage at the midway mark of their semi-final encounter.
‘Two very good teams going against each other’
Jule Brand ruthlessly punished an error from the hosts in their buildup phase, and the setback seemed to throw the Gunners off kilter. However, they roared back after the restart, getting goals through a Mariona Caldentey set piece and a neat Olivia Smith strike to take the lead late in the second half.
The Gunners displayed resilience to turn around a first leg deficit at the same stage of the tournament last year (2025) before beating **Barcelona**1-0 in Lisbon to earn the title in May. They are no strangers to showing strength in times of adversity, and it is one of the qualities that the head coach believes could take the team towards a successful defence of their title ahead of the trip to France for the second leg.
“If you look at Lyon and the qualities they possess, some would say it’s really important to do that and the team did that well. I think with the different tools that we have and the different pitches we can create as a team, it’s in a really good place and the players are so intelligent, solving things, both on the pitch and at half-time, so that was a massive factor in getting more pressure on the ball.
“It’s hard [for the first goal] because it comes in and there’s runners. It’s hard for the goalkeeper to see it when there’s runners in front and yes, it was really clever and happy of course that it went in.
“It was two very good teams going against each other, I think you saw on the pitch. For us it was key to get pressure on the ball and spend time in their half as much as possible which I think we did better and better when the game went on and the players were brilliant, very calm.
“I think they have high belief in the tools they have and the options we have on the pitch with so many different qualities. Just happy with how we grew into the game, with how we minimised Lyon’s threat because they’re a fantastic team but I’m also very aware that it’s only half-time and we have to go to Lyon and they have a lot of strengths. For a half-time score, this is good.
How did the Emirates crowd impact the result?
“We wanted to use the power of the Emirates Stadium and I we did, the crowd was fantastic and the second half, when we found those moments to press and be in their half, you could feel the fans going with us and it created that momentum for us, so that was fantastic, it’s always great to play at the Emirates so we wanted to take advantage at home, we did and now we have to go away next weekend.
“More pressure on the ball allowed us to be more in their half and the dynamics we have and the different tools; diversity of tools that we have in the team at the moment with how we want to do things on the pitch, the different qualities that we have on the pitch.
“I think it was really important for the players to just stay calm, find the solutions and keep on believing. So this is the half-time score and next weekend we go again.”