Hello, Arsenal Women aficionados!
The pitch was terrible, I agree, but for how long should we continue to bring up such poor excuses? If anything, we should consider ourselves lucky to have left Madrid with every player is good health, which is something that Real Madrid cannot say.
The Estadio Alfredo Di Stéfano pitch was unworthy of a UWCL quarter-final, but it was equally terrible for both teams, and we cannot pin the defeat on that.
Losing two-nil away from home puts a huge dent on our chances to go through, and that’s a shame because our performance wasn’t that bad, and surely didn’t warrant such a heavy defeat. We should have been smarter and more mature in taking a one-goal deficit to London, but we pushed for an equalizer and gave Real Madrid a second, and possibly decisive, goal with ten minutes to go.
Lessi " data-image-caption="
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Whereas we had most of the ball and probably the best chances, we lacked composure at both ends of the pitch and were guilty of some horrible individual and collective mistakes, so we should take a hard look in the mirror before pointing our fingers at the weather, the pitch or the referee. In the previous Arsenal Women Journal, I wrote how I hoped that “the players will show the maturity required at this level and keep the tie alive until the return leg”, so I feel a bit betrayed after Tuesday night’s defeat in Spain.
RENÉE’S WORDS
*“It’s only half-time. It’s 2-0 to Real Madrid at the moment but we’re going to play against them again at the Emirates and **we’ll have to believe that we can score two goals with the fans behind us.*”
Somehow and despite all the football I watched over 35 years, I second Renée Slegers’ feeling about the return leg, but with a major caveat: Real Madrid can sit deep and hit us on the counter at the Emirates Stadium, something they truly master also thanks to Linda Caicedo’s talent and speed.
Scoring two goals is not so much of an issue, while not conceding might be a tricky exercise.
Most of the post-game chat revolved about the state of the pitch and the “small margins” that proved decisive, once again. When asked about the difference between us and them, Renée Slegers was very clear in her reply: “I think Real Madrid was ruthless today with what they got from us. They capitalized, so they got maximum reward today and so I think it’s much more of an even game than what the result shows.”
It’s hard to argue with her on that, but I am worried that this defeat could slip into the “one of those days” category, while in reality it was a very intense battle that we lost, quite heavily, in the end. Luckily, Renée Slegers seems very aware of what needs changing for the reverse fixture: *“I don’t believe in bad luck, so I think it’s about the details that we need to do better. So, what kind of attacks do we create, how do we position without the ball. The season hasn’t been perfect all the way, we have been dealing with things along the way and I think that’s part of sport and that’s what makes great athletes and great teams. Teams that can come back and want to get better. […] there’s definitely a lot of key learnings from this game and **we see all the potential opportunities to perform better in the home game.*”
Renee " data-image-caption="
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" data-medium-file="https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee-780x482.png" data-large-file="https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee.png" class="size-medium wp-image-49066 lazyload" alt="Renee" width="780" height="482" data-sizes="(max-width: 780px) 100vw, 780px" src="https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee-780x482.png" srcset="https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee-780x482.png 780w, https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee-200x123.png 200w, https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee-768x474.png 768w, https://gunnerstown.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Renee.png 907w">
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Time will tell how quickly and efficiently we can learn, because we face Liverpool and Real Madrid in quick succession, and both teams are very good at transition football, something we seem to struggle with, recently.
LESSONS LEARNED
Hindsight makes things very easy for people like me, but it felt quite evident that we had to accept the narrow defeat in Madrid, rather than committing players forward in search of an equalizer. Taking into consideration the heavy rain, the muddy pitch, the very intense nature of the game and Real Madrid being incredibly threatening on the counter, we should have kept the ball and let the clock run freely but opted against it and were punished for our naivety.
That’s probably the hardest part to elaborate, especially with so many experienced players on the pitch: Leah Williamson, Mariona Caldentey, Kim Little and Lia Wälti, when she came on, could have done a bit better in organizing the team and keeping possession of the ball, but they could not prevent us from overcommitting in midfield and leaving our defensive line exposed. Same goes for Renée Slegers from the bench, obviously. It’s a lesson learned the hardest way, unfortunately.
When the line-ups came out, it became immediately clear that we would try to catch Real Madrid defensive line with long balls in-behind, and it almost paid off when Stina Blackstenius found herself in a very good position, but her effort was well saved. While the idea seemed very good, we looked too reliant on this specific option and could not control the tempo of the game. Rather than building patiently and looking for the right opportunity, we kept booting the ball in hope that Stina Blackstenius would get ahold of it. Then, when Real Madrid opened the scoring, we kept trying those passes in-behind even if their defensive line retreated by a good fifteen yards and the option was simply no longer viable.
It’s somehow funny that we kept playing short against Liverpool, despite the pitch, and refused to play long, while in Madrid we went to the very opposite and only played long balls. I feel that there is a right approach in between those extremes…
Finally, some individual mistakes proved extremely costly, specifically at the back: I am still unsure about Leah Williamson’s attempt to block the pass going to Linda Caicedo, as well as her decision to keep retreating and give Athenea space and time to shoot, which costed us both goals on the night.
In the first occasion, I cannot understand her decision to lift her foot, rather than keeping it ground level, when trying to intercept the through-ball. On such a wobbly and muddy pitch, it’s very hard to anticipate how the ball will bounce (if it bounces at all…), so lifting the foot looked like asking for troubles. Coming from such an experienced and outstanding defender, it looked very odd.
Similarly, her choice not to tackle Athenea when Real Madrid scored the second of the night left me puzzled, especially when you consider that she wasn’t the last defender and had bodies around and behind her. That said, Manuela Zinsberger should have saved that shot, because it wasn’t especially powerful, nor well placed.
Manu " data-image-caption="
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NEXT’S UP
As briefly mentioned, we will host Liverpool on Saturday in the WSL, at the Emirates Stadium, aiming at solidifying the second place in the league table and hopefully get a morale boost for the return leg in the UWCL.
Our girls will take the field at 5.30pm and I do expect Renée Slegers to rotate her starting XI after such a draining night in Madrid. Players like Lia Wälti, Frida Maanum, Chloe Kelly and Caitlin Foord might be given the nod ahead of some teammates, which would maximize the energy levels against Liverpool and preserve some freshness for the big European night looming at (short) distance.
Speak to you soon!
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Italian living in Switzerland, Gooner since mid-nineties, when the Gunners defeated my hometown team, in Copenhagen. I started my own blog and podcast (www.clockenditalia.com) after after some experiences with Italian websites and football magazines. Covering Arsenal Women with the occasional rant about the boys.
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