Arsenal manager, Jonas Eidevall, spoke to the press following their 2-1 defeat to Manchester City in the WSL, taking responsibility for the poor first half, saying that the team gave the ball away in dangerous positions and did not use the ball well, leading to a lack of control and prolonged periods of defending.

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - FEBRUARY 11: Kim Little of Arsenal looks dejected after Chloe Kelly (not pictured) of Manchester City scores the team's second goal during the FA Women's Super League match between Manchester City and Arsenal at The Academy Stadium on February 11, 2023 in Manchester, England. (Photo by Nathan Stirk/Getty Images)
MANCHESTER, ENGLAND – FEBRUARY 11: Kim Little of Arsenal looks dejected after Chloe Kelly (not pictured) of Manchester City scores the team’s second goal during the FA Women’s Super League match between Manchester City and Arsenal at The Academy Stadium on February 11, 2023 in Manchester, England. (Photo by Nathan Stirk/Getty Images)

Arsenal Women’s team fell to a 2-1 defeat against Manchester City Women in the Barclays Women’s Super League all but ending their title ambitions for the season, sending fans to casinosource.co.uk as Arsenal’s odds rocket.

Lauren Hemp scored the fastest goal for City in the WSL this season after only 3 minutes and 5 seconds. Chloe Kelly added another before halftime.

Rafaelle pulled one back for Arsenal in the second half, but it was too late to turn the game around.

Despite a stronger second half performance from the Gunners, a comeback was not on the cards.

Manchester City have now overtaken Arsenal in the WSL table and are in third place, although Arsenal still have a game in hand.

When speaking at his press conference, Eidevall also mentioned how City’s aggressive front three limited the time and space for the players to build from the back.

Eidevall also discussed City’s change in tactics, with them flattening out their midfield, which made it harder for Arsenal to build attacks from their wide players.

He also noted that Arsenal lacked positioning and failed to get their players inside centrally to move and open up City’s organisation.

Eidevall did not regret his decision to go with a back three and stated that the team still needs to work on controlling the ball and sustaining attacks.

Finally, he emphasised that Arsenal’s focus remains on the next game and winning it, not on the title race.

“When you look at the game we were not good in possession in two respects, one is that we gave the ball away in very dangerous positions that they convert into goal scoring opportunities,” Eidevall said.

“The second is that we didn’t use the ball well. It means we cannot sustain attacks which means, from a control perspective we have to defend for long periods.

“They are very aggressive with their front three and that limits the time and space that the players have to build from the back.

“It is my responsibility, I have to look and see ‘can we find players earlier and find their positions earlier?’ Can we play through to the free player? We end up having one touch too much on the ball and it eats the time and the space which then results in a mistake.

“But that is my responsibility to find out how we can position earlier and take up better positions and play away from pressure and turn that into strength?

“They still press from out to in with their wide players and get your centre-halves onto their weak foot. We do the same thing. What they did today to deal with our wide players was to flatten out their midfield, they changed during the game on Wednesday to do this too. Instead of just playing Hasegawa as a lone 6, they drop one of their 8s. They do a little like Liverpool men when they won the league and flatten their midfield.

“That is why they used Angeldahl and Coombs today because they can run. But when we play the ball out to our wide players the difference from Wednesday was that no player was coming onto the ball because their full-back is occupied with another one of our other players. We couldn’t take our first touch forward and build our attacks from that.

“Today one player from their central midfield leaves that area and we have a midfielder and a full-back on our wide player so now we need additional passes from the spaces they are leaving. We need to play the ball to our six and play diagonally to the 10. We didn’t get our 6s into that position so the only option our wide player has is to play the ball to our 10 and into a one v one situation.

“We lose that situation a lot of times today. For us structurally, we needed to have more players inside centrally to move and open up City’s organisation. We could not do it because we lacked the positioning.

“There are a lot of things we have to consider when we do that and a lot of things you guys don’t know either, like how many minutes we have certain players available for and what does that do to team selection.

“I understand that, I am probably the only one in the room with the full picture in my choices. I don’t regret it given all the information I had beforehand.

“I think there were things we could have done better but the way we control the ball and not sustaining attacks was a problem in the second half still. Something that disappoints me is that we didn’t give that a better chance.

“I felt when we scored, for the five minutes after that, I felt City looked tired and collapsed a bit in their organisation and we could have used that and moved the ball better and used the wings better and built momentum into the game but we didn’t.

“There we let the game slip a little bit.”

Asked about Arsenal’s title hopes with them now five points behind Chelsea, Eidevall said, ”

“We go game by game, it is always the same, we focus on the next game, that never changes.”

The next game for Arsenal Women is against Chelsea in the Vitality Women’s FA Cup fifth round after the international break.