Reaction'Full of admiration' - Gareth Taylor on LFC Women's pre-season progress
Gareth Taylor was ‘full of admiration’ for his team after Liverpool FC Women’s entertaining 2-2 draw in a friendly against Manchester United.
The Reds fell behind early in Wednesday night’s pre-season encounter at Leigh Sports Village but excellent finishes from Ceri Holland and Cornelia Kapocs saw them lead until the last minute of normal time.
Ella Toone volleyed home a late equaliser for the home side to deny Taylor’s charges a win, but the new head coach was happy with much of what he saw.
“Some fantastic goals, some really good play, we had to put a lot of energy into the game because United made it difficult,” he told Liverpoolfc.com post-match.
“We are behind them a little bit in pre-season as well and probably with squad numbers, too, which is always tough.
“But I was really full of admiration for the girls for how they pushed through that barrier and I thought for large parts of the second half we got better.”
Goalkeeper Rafaela Borggrafe was punished when trying to play out from the back for the United opener.
But the summer signing went on to make several fine saves for her team and Taylor was delighted by such a response.
“She was excellent and I like to see that,” he said. “When you see the performance after the mistake, I think that speaks volumes of her as a person because it’s really easy to go inward.
“We’ve spoken a lot to the players about it in the short time since we came in – errors are fine but it’s the reaction to them. Unfortunately it’s part of the process, but after that you saw her level of performance was really good.”
Holland levelled the game with a fine curler with her left foot in the first half, before a stunner from Kapocs that found the top corner after the break.
Taylor said: “We spoke to the forward players the other day and because we’ve only been in for a short time our concentration probably hasn’t been at the top end of the pitch.
“So we’ll work with the individuals a lot and Ceri has been very receptive, as has Kappy on the other side, so for our wingers to score those goals is exciting and they should be proud because they were very good goals.
“Mia [Enderby] looked sharp down the middle as well and I think she’s going to cause a lot of problems for defences.
“Once we get fitter, once we get stronger and begin to learn and develop a bit more with each other, I’m really excited to see where the team can go.”
The squad now turn focus to a behind-closed-doors friendly at the AXA Melwood Training Centre on Sunday against West Ham United and then embark on a training camp in the Republic of Ireland next week.
“It’s just a nice environment to go to where you spend more time with each other,” added the boss. “It’ll be a really nice environment, somewhere a little bit different to Melwood and sets us up nicely for the season-opener.”