Arsenal boss Jonas Eidevall says that his team will have to go back to basics with the loss of Kim Little and Beth Mead from his starting line-up. Little is out until the New Year with a knee injury while Mead ruptured her ACL on Saturday evening.
Both have been total mainstays of Jonas Eidevall’s starting line-up since he arrived in the summer of 2021. The Arsenal boss admitted he made a mistake in his preparation for the United game in not taking enough account of the absence of Kim Little, with the first choice centre-halves Leah Williamson and Rafaelle also unavailable.
“I think you can take things for granted,” he told Arseblog News. “When I reflect on the United game one of the things I learned is that, sometimes, when you change players, you don’t just change a player, you are putting out a new team.”
Jonas didn’t mention Kim Little’s name but it’s probably clear that that is what he means by a player changing leading to a team changing.
“That means that everything you now do, you have to start from the basics. You can’t take for granted that just because you did something three weeks ago that that will automatically happen again.
“That’s what we need to work with and don’t forget the basics. We are building again, block by block. We cannot continue building something we had five weeks ago. I think I made a mistake with the United game, even though the time was short (to prepare) but we will put that right now in how we prepare.”
Arseblog News asked Jonas Eidevall whether he felt the injury to Beth Mead might have had its roots in fatigue. A couple of weeks ago, he told the site that he felt the increasing schedule in women’s football and the list of injuries to top players was not a coincidence.
“It’s a good question but it’s hard to answer because we don’t know all the variables. Player loading and fatigue are things we constantly monitor and that we are concerned about. If that had been a factor that had been obvious for us leading up to this game, we would not have played her.
“But it can still happen and it’s so difficult when you see the amount of injuries and you see the schedule, especially for players playing international tournaments, I don’t think it helps with injuries.”
Interesting to see what changes he makes to the team. I saw someone suggest a diamond in midfield with two strikers which sounds like a goo idea given what we have. But losing width on that side will be a massive blow especially when you consider how many teams sit deep in the WSL and how exploiting space out wide is how we’ve scored so many times and teams who play deeper need to be shifted around. but I’m sure Jonas has the tactical prowess to make a good team.