West Ham United: Women’s expert reacts to loss v Liverpool
West Ham Women’s expert Michelle Irons has provided her reaction to the defeat against Liverpool on 17 March.
The Reds went 3-0 up through Leanne Kiernan, Missy Bo Kearns and Sophie Roman Haug before Hammers forward Riko Ueki grabbed a late consolation.
Irons criticised the East Londoners for their “lazy” approach to the game as their hopes of fighting off relegation from the WSL suffered a blow on Merseyside.
“The team set-up looked good,” Irons exclusively told West Ham Zone.
“I think the central pairing of Zadorksy and Tysiak, with Cissoko tucked in there is probably our best defence at this stage. But keeping a clean sheet seems to be a huge challenge for this team.
“I was not at all confident for this fixture as Liverpool are chasing the top-four positions and are picking up points with a real sense of urgency.
“I’ve been very impressed with them this season and, of course, they have an ex-West Ham manager and players in their squad.
“Liverpool opened the scoring just before the break, with former West Ham striker Leanne Kiernan poking home. She’s only just come back from a long-term injury and quickly reacted to a loose ball before Zadorsky could get there. Down at the break again.
“The second goal came quickly after the restart. A thrown-in was not given much attention and Liverpool capitalised on our lazy approach, quickly crossing the ball into the danger zone, with a bullet header flying straight past Arnold. Liverpool were cruising at this point.
“They made it three with the same type of attack as the previous goal. Liverpool don’t hang around, they build an attack straight away and didn’t give us time to react.
“But we are slow and lack any motivation. A very simple cross was volleyed in. We are simply not good enough in attack or defence.
“Liverpool earned this win with West Ham giving nothing in return apart from Ueki latching on to a loose pass from the keeper near the end.
“I just don’t know what to say with this team, it’s exasperating most of the time. We beat Arsenal but failed to beat Liverpool and Everton? We have 12 points from 16 games played, which is quite frankly disgusting.
“We are still flirting with relegation, nothing has changed for a few seasons and a few managers can’t change this let alone the current one.
“Something needs to change at this club or we will fall away. We certainly have good players, there is no doubt about that. But we just can’t seem to get them singing from the same hymn sheet.”
West Ham Women need to pick up victories
It’s a pretty perilous position that West Ham currently find themselves in on the back of what has been an extremely disappointing season.
They would have been hoping to put in a decent performance against Liverpool after earning a draw in their previous match against Manchester United.
As Irons points out, the points total they have racked up across their 16 games during this campaign is simply not good enough and needs to change quickly.
The fixtures aren’t getting any easier for them, though, as they now prepare to face second-place Chelsea on Sunday (24 March).
In other West Ham news, Jim White and Simon Jordan have been caught in an explosive row over a Hammers controversy.
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