InterviewGareth Taylor: We have a lot of positivity heading into the new season
Gareth Taylor believes his Liverpool FC Women team approach the new campaign with ‘a lot of positivity’ after a 100 per cent record in pre-season.
The Reds enjoyed an emphatic 7-1 win over Durham at St Helens Stadium on Sunday in their final warm-up for 2026-27.
Beata Olsson’s rapid first-half hat-trick was followed by goals from Marie Höbinger, Ceri Holland, Sara Agrez and Vic Jones.
The victory was the fifth in a row for Taylor’s charges after Sheffield United, Leicester City, Birmingham City and Manchester United had been beaten previously.
Post-match, Liverpoolfc.com caught up with the head coach for his reflections on pre-season and mindset ahead of the Barclays Women’s Super League opener at Charlton Athletic this weekend.
Read the chat below.
On another win in pre-season giving reason for optimism…
Yeah, we have to be pleased with the pre-season. I’ve just said to the girls, there’s a lot of positivity around the pre-season. Of course, we get down to business next week and then it’s just a case of that heavy period up until the first international break, we’ve just got to make sure we don’t pick up any other issues because we’re not a squad that can carry those. We’ve not got lots and lots of options, you can see that with the young players getting onto the pitch, just to try to offload some of our players that we’re going to need so much in this next month.
On the key things he wanted to see from the team during pre-season…
We need any team that we work with to be really fit – we feel like we’ve had a good pre-season in order to be able to do that. The players are looking finely tuned, the levels of fitness have been very good. For us, it’s playing quickly, playing through lines much quicker, purpose with our passing. Taking on opportunities and if they don’t come off, knowing we’re going to be really aggressive and try to win the ball back quickly.
On Olsson’s confidence heading into the campaign…
Of course. Any striker wants to go in with a good feeling – and a good feeling for them is goals. The strikers are really dedicated to wanting to score goals, and I think that’s really good for Beata that she’s had a wide range of good opportunities today and she’s taken most of them. It’s a really nice game for her to go into the season with.
On summer signing Mari Ward making her first appearance…
Yeah, pleased for Mari. She’ll only improve and get better. I think she’s got a lot within her makeup to do really well and do really well for us as a club. So, I think she’s an exciting one for the future.
On academy players getting minutes during the pre-season schedule and Jones scoring versus Durham…
Again, another player with a lot of talent. These players are young, very young. But it’s exciting to see that they’re going to be good players in the future. The talent is there for sure. That’s the exciting thing – when you look at those types of players we’ve got coming through, it’s a reason to be excited.