Arsenal head coach Renée Slegers has said her role is ‘very demanding’ as WSL coaches call for greater support in the game.
The Gunners return from the international break to face Leicester City at the King Power Stadium this Sunday in the Women’s Super League (WSL).
Arsenal have a tough run of fixtures ahead, with Leicester (away), Chelsea (home), Bayern Munich (away), Tottenham (away) and Real Madrid (home) in the space of just 17 days. Their first block of games at the start of the season has seen some mixed results and performances, so there is pressure to deliver and win games. Slegers shared that she has looked at every aspect of the performances lately: “Like you now hear, from all aspects, from a football perspective, from a psychological perspective, from a physical perspective as well.”
WSL coaches deal with a lot of pressure. Rehanne Skinner, West Ham women manager, has spoken a lot lately on mental health in coaches and has called for better structures to be put in place for them. The Halfway Line asked Slegers what mental health means to her.
“It’s very demanding,” Slegers said. “This role and not only from a workload perspective, it’s not the hours and the work that you have to do, but of course, it’s the emotional demands as well. I definitely agree that we have to look at structures and systems that make it harder for bad things to happen. So we have the support system in place as a league, as a federation and so forth.
“I think that’s very important because I’m only young and I have only done a couple of years. Of course, I’ve coached in the Swedish league as well. This is my first time in England and the game here is so big, there’s so much pressure. What I try to do is manage myself the best way possible. So that’s all I can do at the time. And having a coach, having my own coping strategies, making sure that I get my recovery, I get my time to understand myself, deal with my thoughts, feelings in a good way.
So I can self regulate most of the time. But yeah, it is very demanding and I would definitely agree with Rehanne that it’s important that there is a good system in place.”
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Disappointment for injured Agyemang and Zinsberger says Slegers
Renée Slegers revealed that everyone apart from Manuela Zinsberger and Leah Williamson is in contention to play Arsenal’s WSL game away at Leicester City on Sunday.
The news comes after an international break for which several players didn’t travel to their national teams or travelled back to the club early. Lotte Wubben-Moy (sickness) and Olivia Smith (hip injury) left their respective national teams early, whereas Daphne van Domselaar (not fit enough) and Katie Reid (groin injury) did not join up with their national teams after being called up initially. This was especially hard for Katie Reid, who got her first call up for the Lionesses, being just 19 years old.
Slegers was asked about how Reid reacted to not being able to travel to St George’s Park.
“She was disappointed because of course she looked forward to it very, very much. But she said this is reality as it is right now. She said, I have to accept it and I’m going to do everything to come back as quickly as possible and the next game for me to play will be for Arsenal and I’ll work really hard and keep on doing my thing”.
Arsenal player Michelle Agyemang, who is on loan at Brighton this season, suffered an ACL injury in England’s match against Australia on Tuesday.
“Her loan at Brighton has been really positive and she’s got all those minutes for England contributing euros,” Slegers said on the disappointment of the injury. “So she was in a really good place. So of course it’s always the timing of this isn’t great, it’s never good timing. But she’s very strong and we’re of course very proud to have her and we know that she has the strength to come back and we’re going to do everything to support her.”
Manuela Zinsberger also suffered an ACL injury in training ahead of the international break. She has found it hard to deal with the injury, said Slegers.
“She hasn’t had big injuries through her career, so it’s something new for her. And she said, I haven’t done this, so I don’t know how to deal with this. But everyone is so supportive of her. We have a fantastic setup from a medical perspective and she will get all the help and support that she needs to be able to be as fit as possible and to recover from this big injury. She hasn’t done her surgery yet, so that’s where she’s at.”
Arsenal start their tough run of five games this Sunday, away against Leicester City at the King Power Stadium at 12pm BST.