Vivianne Miedema’s brace against Liverpool on Thursday night moved her three goals clear at the top of the goal-scoring charts while Arsenal kept themselves in the hunt for a Champions League place.

Arsenal came away from their game against Liverpool with a narrow 3-2 win, the winner coming in the second half after the teams played out a 2-2 draw in the first 45.

The prolific 23-year-old scored what were her first goals of 2020, but they took her to 16 for the WSL season, three ahead of Chelsea’s Beth England.

The win also kept Arsenal in the hunt for second place in the league and a Champions League spot. They are now two points behind Chelsea, who are in second, but the Blues have a game in hand.

Barring a miracle, they will not retain their title this season after recent back-to-back defeats to fellow challengers City and Chelsea.

“You obviously start looking at the clock, but then you kind of know there is always going to be that one chance and luckily that came,” Miedema said after her 78th minute goal turned out to be the winner.

“From there on, I didn’t have the feeling that we were going to give it away again.”

It was far from all good news, however, as Beth Mead left the pitch with a knee injury leaving Arsenal dangerously short of players ahead of this weekend.

Kim Little will not be available after undergoing surgery on a foot problem, while Lia Walti and Danielle Carter are also unavailable. Jill Roord, however, should be back at the weekend along with Katrine Veje, who was serving a one-game suspension against Liverpool.

Caitlin Foord is expected to arrive in England on Friday but it’s unclear if she’ll be ready to play having had no time to integrate with her new team mates.

Arsenal play Lewes on Sunday at Meadow Park with a 1pm kick-off in the FA Cup.