Aston Villa Women Experts: Victory on the road as Rachel Daly enters the history books
We’re delighted to welcome author Freya Taylor and former academy player Lyndsey Bissell as our exclusive Aston Villa Women experts. Each week they’ll be collaborating to give their views on the biggest talking points at the WSL club…
Aston Villa Women secured a stunning victory on the road in their latest fixture; with superstar Rachel Daly netting a superb hat trick to put her name into the history books. Her goals during this match meant she was the first English woman to score 20 goals in one WSL season. She’s also now leapfrogged Bunny Shaw into the top spot for the race to the golden boot.
The hosts came out ready to fight knowing they needed to take something from this match, with the reality of relegation looming ever closer. Villa however didn’t start as sharply as they previously had and took their time to find their rhythm at the Select Car Leasing Stadium. However, Carla Ward’s squad were soon on the attack and 14 minutes into the game they opened their account for the evening. A beautiful cross in from Kirsty Hanson (thankfully back in the starting lineup after not being available for selection against her parent club) allowed Daly to seal her first of the evening with a simple tap-in.
Throughout the first half, Villa were overall quite clumsy on the attack and although they were creating chances, it felt as though something wasn’t clicking in midfield. Reading although had started with confidence and on the attack, soon began giving away the ball through some sloppy passing. A surefire way to be punished by a strong side such as Aston Villa. As always, Dan Turner proved to be a vital cog in the Villa machine, creating some fantastic blocks throughout the match.
Alisha Lehmann had another fantastic game in claret and blue as she dominated down the wing and was relentless throughout her time on the pitch. Her eureka moment came a few moments before the end of the first half, when Daly (goal scorer now turning provider) crossed the ball beautifully into Lehmann who tapped it home. Almost a perfect mirror of Daly’s opening goal.
With Villa 2-0 and oozing confidence, a free kick in a great position saw the England international almost double her tally, but the ball was sent just beyond the crossbar.
In the dying moments of the first half, Daly showed why she is so deserving of each and every accolade she gets, after stealing the ball from a sloppy Reading goal kick. Gaining possession and making the short dash back to the home side’s net, unselfishly she looked up and spotted Hanson who found the net herself with ease. The visiting side were holding fantastic momentum going into the second half, the question was, how many more goals could they add to their scoresheet in the next 45 minutes?
As the clock started again, we would have loved to see Villa move the ball faster down the pitch. They’ve got the pace and the fitness, they just needed to find the final quality in the box that we’ve been wishing to see all season. What we have noticed about the way Villa play, however, is that we’ve been lacking a person to aim for up front; as Daly can drop quite deep to win the ball. Perhaps once Emily Gielnik is back from injury, this could allow Daly to not always play in that number nine role, but has someone else up front with her in support waiting to receive the ball, rather than her trying to do a lot of the work herself.
It is also apparent that although we don’t have a consistent clinical quality yet, it’s easy to see how the gap between the bottom and the middle (us) is now the same gap between the middle and the top. Chelsea, for example, just need one chance to shoot and win, we need a couple of chances but the goals do come, whereas Reading and other teams at the bottom have their chances but lack the quality to make anything from them consistently.
Within the first few minutes of the second half, Reading had their best chance in front of goal. A scramble in the box, saw Jade Moore and Emma Mukandi both try and get the ball into the visitor’s net, but the final ball was sent just wide. A lucky Villa escape. The claret and blues need to be calmer and more composed (as they have previously lost their early advantage to Tottenham Hotspur) as they can’t afford to become complacent.
After this early chance, it felt as though Reading gave up the fight. The gaps in their defence that had been there, but smaller in the first half, widened even more so, and even though Kelly Chambers made her substitutions, fresh legs just weren’t enough to fight back against this determined Villa side.
Within the next ten minutes, the deadly duo of Kenza Dali and Daly found their rhythm and Daly got her brace! Moments later, a hattrick was almost in sight as the Lioness looped the ball over Mukandi but the effort went just wide.
At 4-0 up, Ward decided to make some changes and bring some familiar faces on the pitch to gain their first minutes back this season after being out with long-term injuries. Joining Ruesha Littlejohn (on for Lucy Staniforth in midfield) were Remi Allen (a wealth of experience on the pitch) and Chaney Boye-Hlorkah who both return from long ACL injuries, to replace Laura Blinkilde Brown and Lehmann. As the gaffer knows, our bench isn’t in the strongest position, so by waiting this long to make changes it allows our quality first-XI players to stay on the pitch to gain the advantage and then changes are able to be made.
Soon after the switch in personnel, Daly had the moment we’ve been waiting for. Another hattrick from an attacking move she created herself. Passing the ball to Pacheco, Daly drove forward into the box, received the ball back and hit it true with her left foot. Daly now stands two goals clear of Manchester City’s Shaw in the race for the golden boot and we couldn’t be prouder to call her one of the pride.
Reading however still had their moments in the game. Rachel Rowe, who has been a constant threat this season, had her shot on goal but Hannah Hampton was there as always to save the shot. It was a quiet second half for the England international but she proved to be a safe pair of hands as always.
Ward’s next substitution allowed Kirsty Hanson to take a breather as Simone Magill (also back from an ACL injury) finally got to make her debut for Villa after picking up her injury during the Euros with Northern Ireland. Although relatively quiet on the pitch to start, when Magill finally did receive the ball she nearly scored in the 80th minute! But the ball just didn’t bounce quite right for her this time. A very promising start for the Northern Irish international and it’s great to finally see her out on the pitch.
Massive shout out to Dali who seemed to cover every blade of grass, and who earned our player of the match title. She’s such a creative player and we can always rely on her to make things happen. However, in an unusual turn of events to her usually selfless style of play, Dali dribbled all the way into the box and while Daly was there with her in support, she took the shot herself and ultimately couldn’t find the back of the net. Although we don’t blame her for wanting to be on the scoresheet too, we could also see she realised her mistake by her head-in-her-hands reaction as the ball then fell back to Reading for a half-hearted counter-attack.
While Villa were dynamic down the wings, overall the team were still a bit messy in the middle which we need to sharpen up as we’ve been punished for this by the bigger teams in the past. Rather than playing It out from the back, it would have been great to see Hampton use some more long balls to try and pick out Daly as it was the right type of game to do this with. We were happy that the score line reflected the game as it shows how tenacious the visiting side were today, hungry for points.
On a positive note, it was a record attendance for Reading so it is a shame they lost 0-5 in front of such a large crowd. But this is what we want to see in the women’s game moving forward and hopefully, this becomes the norm for Reading.
One of the most fantastic moments for us was hearing the Villa fans chanting through the FA Player stream. Knowing our supporters have made the long journey and can be heard so clearly would have been a phenomenal help to the squad and clearly boosted their confidence today. It could have been a phenomenal 6-0 win too, if Daly’s header in the 95th minute hadn’t landed in the hands of the Reading keeper.
Finally, Villa are still moving completely in the right direction, our fitness levels much better, the quality of our play is improving and Ward’s plan is still clear to see.
In terms of the table, after a 7-0 defeat to Chelsea, our closest competitors Everton are now six points behind us.
On the other hand, Reading’s men’s team are also being relegated this season and as the women’s team is the only team in the league not affiliated with the men’s we know financially this will be tough one to take for Kelly Chambers. We don’t want to see any players with great potential leave the league, so it could be an interesting opportunity for Grace Maloney or Rowe be a potential future signing for Ward in the summer window?
With two matches left to play in this season, Aston Villa should secure a fifth-place finish, but we need to keep pushing to ensure we take as many points as we can from Liverpool and Arsenal.
In other Aston Villa Women news, Evie Rabjohn’s move to Manchester United Women is a massive blow.