Rick Passmoor is now the permanent LCFC Women manager, and he’s just had an international break with the bulk of the squad to refine his now familiar East Midlands Catenaccio style.
Arsenal were missing a few big players and are going through a relatively rocky patch of form across the WSL and the Champions League. This was, surprisingly, a game between 5th and 9th in the league. That 5th-place team happens to be the European champions and has two players that you can reasonably argue were unlucky to miss out on the Ballon d’Or this year (That’s Mariona Caldentey and Alessia Russo, for those interested in my hot takes). The four places between us in the league looked like quite a gulf after a disastrous first half saw Leicester go in 3-0 down to leave us lucky to come away losing only 4-1.
Arsenal started quickly, producing a warning from Stina Blackstenius immediately after kick-off. Her pace is no secret, and I’m sure Leicester are aware of this, but that doesn’t add up to the ability to defend against it. The first goal came quickly from a low cross from the right by Beth Mead, into the feet of Blackstenius, who inadvertently flicked it on for Russo. It was a textbook Arsenal goal and exactly what we knew we needed to look out for. It was also a harbinger of doom and a bleak look into the rest of the first half.
Leicester generally give away a lot of possession, but this was a lot even for us. Arsenal were getting a lot of time and space in midfield, and it felt like we made the tackle at the last possible moment. Chantelle Swaby looked strong and read the game well, slipping between the player and the ball on a few occasions. Leicester did occasionally get forward, once down the left through a run from deep by Asmita Ale, which saw Mead track back and deal out a meaty slide tackle. From the resulting throw-in, the pitch looked ridiculously congested, and there was manic pressing from all angles. Arsenal looked to go back to Daphne van Domselaar, and Shannon O’Brien charged her down and almost bundled the ball into the net. Capitalising on a mistake and scoring through sheer obstinacy was the plan for Leicester anyway at this point.
Not long after that, Arsenal got their second through a painful own goal from Sari Kees. Russo found some space on the right-hand side of our back three and in behind. Caitlin Foord was in the 6-yard box ready for the pass, but so were a few Leicester defenders. It’s one of those own goals where the fault happened earlier in the build-up, then a defender going back to their own goal needs to get something on it. Mead was then found unmarked in the box, and brought a miraculous save from Janina Leitzig.
The inevitable third goal came from a lovely team move from Arsenal, with Russo dropping deep, passing out to the right for Mead, who clipped it into the path of Blackstenius, who whacked it into the top right of Leitzig’s goal. This was the point where it really got nasty. The one thing we usually have is good defensive organisation, but yesterday that went completely missing. We were playing against the European champions; their attacking movement is a cut above most WSL teams.
At half time, we made three substitutions, Jutta Rantala, Olivia McLoughlin and Shannon O’Brien coming off for Hlin Eiriksdottir, Emily Van Egmond and Noemie Mouchon. It didn’t look like any kind of change in shape, but it might have just been the idea of putting fresh legs on in midfield positions.
The changes nearly paid off immediately, Mouchon rushing forward ahead of three Arsenal defenders and getting a good shot away. You tend to forget that you can just run straight at the goal and shoot. The slightest bit of attacking vigour returning on our side didn’t slow down Arsenal’s attack at all. Blackstenius got in behind the back line again, forcing Swaby into a brilliant recovery run and big tackle to dispossess her before she could either put Arsenal 4-0 up or force another save that reminds us how lucky we are to have Leitzig.
The middle of the second half was mercifully uneventful. A triple substitution by Arsenal on the hour mark broke up some of Arsenal’s attacking fluency and also removed Katie McCabe and Caldentey from the game. But they also brought the nation’s sweetheart Chloe Kelly on, so it’s swings and roundabouts really. It’s a real reminder of the gulf in individual quality between the two sides.
Mouchon made something happen again with a similar sort of run between the left-hand side of the Arsenal defence. She cut the ball into three whole attacking players in the box, and there were too many touches that let Arsenal gather themselves and see it off with no real danger. It sometimes feels like Mouchon would be better off trying to just go it alone than involve any other players. And that’s exactly what she did in the last 10 minutes of the match. It was the third time we’d seen Mouchon run towards goal with defenders chasing after her. She kept her composure beautifully and slipped the ball past van Domselaar. But that rush of blood to the head was clearly too much, as within seconds of that goal, Blackstenius was again smashing the ball into the Leicester goal to make it 4-1.
After a first half that went about as badly as possible, it was good to see Passmoor know his squad well enough to make changes that had a discernible influence on the game. We certainly managed to close some of the gaps in the backline through the second half and looked nowhere near as vulnerable. Our goal and any danger going forward came through Mouchon, and she has to be our big hope for goals this season. She went down late in the game, clutching her knee, but thankfully, it looked like just a clash rather than a recurrence of the dreaded ACL that is far too common in the women’s game.
After this game, we’re left at 10th in the league. We remain a whole 5 points ahead of Liverpool and West Ham, who are rooted to the bottom of the league without a point between them after 7 games. Next weekend we’re away at West Ham, surely our best chance of getting our first league away win of the season. You couldn’t get a quality of opponent much more different to this week’s. If we can play the way we did in the second half today in east London, a win would push us a long way towards staying up this season already.