Saturday, April 20, 2024

Arsenal Women Weekly Round Up: Another Year, Another Final

Arsenal Women
Tim Stillman
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YET ANOTHER CONTI CUP FINAL
Arsenal have qualified for the Continental Tyres WSL Cup Final for the 7th time in the competition’s 8 year history- having won it 5 times before. They will face Manchester City in a repeat of last year’s final, which the Gunners won 1-0 thanks to a Vivianne Miedema goal at Adams’ Park.

This year’s final takes place at Sheffield United’s Bramall Lane on Saturday, 23rd February at 1215pm. The game will be screened live on BT Sport. Tickets are available at £10 adults and £1 concessions and Arsenal have confirmed they will run coach travel. We will, of course, have full build-up and exclusive match reaction on Arseblog News.

CHELSEA AND CITY DRAW TO HANDLE WSL TITLE INITIATIVE TO ARSENAL
Manchester City and Chelsea played out an entertaining 2-2 draw at the Academy Stadium on Sunday, while Arsenal rested up. Goals from Tessa Wullaert and Georgia Stanway gave the leaders a 2-0 half-time lead. But a pair of second half goals from Ji gave defending champions Chelsea a creditable draw.

The result is a good one for Arsenal, who trail City by 2 points at the top of the table but have 2 games in hand. Chelsea are 4 points back on the Gunners in 3rd but have also played 2 games more than the Gunners. Arsenal play Manchester City at home on the final day of the season.

TOPPING THE CHARTS
Arsenal players continue to busy Opta statisticians, with the Gunners’ wide forward Beth Mead topping the assist charts, while striker Vivianne Miedema tops the goalscoring charts. The Dutch striker has 16 for the season in the WSL as well as 9 goals in 6 appearances (1 as sub) in the Conti Cup.

I spoke to Beth Mead a little about her new creative role after the Manchester United victory, “I really enjoy playing on the wing, I’ve become an assister rather than a goalscorer, but I know I need to score more. Today I got in some good positions and had some chances and I just have to keep plugging away and the goals will come.”

LEAH ON TREBLE TRAIL
Arsenal are still on for a domestic treble, with a domestic cup final, a mouth-watering 5th round clash against Chelsea on Sunday and a tight title race to enjoy. 21 year old Leah Williamson is not intimidated by talk of a treble, telling Uefa.com, “For a club like Arsenal every trophy is on our list.

“This is the first year for a while where every trophy still looks realistic at this stage of the season and we’ll go for everything and see where we are.” The full interview with Paul Saffer of uefa.com is available below.

LIVERPOOL AWAY REARRANGED
The Gunners were due to face Liverpool Women at Tranmere Rovers’ Prenton Park yesterday, but the game was rescheduled for Sunday, 24th March. This is because Liverpool’s cup tie against MK Dons was postponed due to inclement weather last week and rearranged for this weekend. It means Montemurro’s side now have 2 games in hand in the WSL.

KATIE McCABE NOMINATED FOR WSL PLAYER OF THE MONTH
Arsenal and Ireland winger Katie McCabe has been nominated for WSL Player of the Month for January. McCabe played in all three of Arsenal’s WSL games in January, scoring a peach of a goal in the 3-0 win at Reading and providing an outstanding stoppage time assist for Vivianne Miedema in the Conti Cup quarter-final against Birmingham.

LOUISE QUINN AT 50
Katie’s Irish international teammate Louise Quinn reached 50 Arsenal appearances after starring in the 2-1 victory over Manchester United on Thursday. Quinn signed at the beginning of the Spring Series in 2017 after Notts County were suddenly folded. She has earned two long term contract extensions since then. You can read our January feature interview with Louise Quinn here.

JORDAN NOBBS OPENS UP ON WORLD CUP HEARTBREAK

Gunners midfielder Jordan Nobbs has opened up on her World Cup heartbreak, after a cruciate ligament injury obtained in November ruled her out of the tournament. Nobbs was enjoying a superb season prior to the injury, but her knee buckled in the turf at Everton in November and she told BBC Sport’s Jo Currie that she instantly knew her World Cup was over.

“As soon as I heard it pop, it was weird. It was like everything stopped for two seconds and then my knee started to tingle. I knew then that it was a big issue. I love this club, Arsenal, but the first thing on my mind was the World Cup, In women’s football and at a major tournament, that’s where you show how world class you are.”

You can read the full interview below:

ALEX SCOTT CHANGING THE GAME
Former Arsenal right-back and captain Alex Scott has been talking about her punditry career and the importance of giving opportunities from people of all backgrounds. Scott grew up in Tower Hamlets and was picked up by Arsenal at the age of 8 after impressing in a boy’s cage football tournament in Stepney. Scott studied for a degree in journalism and broadcasting in the final years of her playing career.

At a launch event, Scott said, “Going into broadcasting wasn’t about changing the game, it’s because actually I’m doing something I love, but being on that journey, I realise the importance [of representing women and minorities]. From my beginning from the east end of London.

“It’s not a sob story, it made me the person I am today. It’s seeing kids from any area or background you’re from. There’s a chance, you can make it.” The whole interview is linked below. You can read our exclusive interview with Alex the day she played her last game for Arsenal last May here.

LEGENDS ASSEMBLE
FIFA launched their ‘Legends Assemble’ campaign to promote the upcoming Women’s World Cup in France in June. The ‘Legends Assemble’ campaign features stars from men’s and women’s football, focusing on their ‘superpowers’, in order to promote the tournament to aspiring female footballers.

The campaign has a heavy Arsenal presence with Gunners legends Kelly Smith and Alex Scott involved, as well as Arsenal invincible Gilberto Silva (The Invisible Wall) all lending their support to the campaign. The World Cup kicks off on 7th June as hosts France face South Korea.

MOTHER MARY
Mary Phillips was a member of Arsenal’s 2006-07 squad who managed to win the Quadruple without losing a single match. Phillip played for the Gunners for 4 years from 2004-08, largely as a no nonsense defender. She captained England and earned 5 caps for her country overall.

Nowadays, Phillip is still in football as a coach at men’s team Peckham Town. In a fascinating interview, Phillips talks about dropping out of the game for 2 years as a player for her children and why she turned down the Millwall Lionesses manager role this summer for the same reasons.

COMING UP
We will have a full match preview of Sunday’s FA Cup tie at Chelsea on the site on Friday, as well as exclusive player reaction from that game on Sunday evening. But on Wednesday, we will be publishing our February feature interview with Arsenal winger Lisa Evans, who talks about the #WePlayStrong campaign, the importance of female role models for young girls playing football and her decision to move to Germany as a young player and conquering the German language.

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Sam

Brilliant article, such a wide variety of very positive and interesting news. Keep them coming please COYG

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p0lowww

Thank you for the weekly round-up! The coverage of Arsenal’s youth and women teams is really great, it’s part of what makes me come every day on Arseblog.

What a great side we have, I hope they go on to win at least 1 trophy this season, fingers crossed for the treble! COYG!

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Nikhil Agarwal

Hope we win the title this year, again 🙂
Awesome job, Tim.

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canon fodder

I just wish that we hadn’t suffered so many injuries, I think that we have four first team players out with injuries, had they all been fit we’s be well away from Man C. Hopefully three of the players will be back this season, Nobbs, unfortunately, will be out for the best part of the year though!

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