LFC WomenMatt Beard column: West Ham draw, Dowie and Lawley return and Rylee Foster update

We got another point on the road in the Barclays Women’s Super League at West Ham but I felt we weren’t at our best. We looked a little bit lethargic on Sunday, if I’m being honest. But I still felt we were the better team and created the better chances.

On reflection, a draw was a fair result in what was a tough game, but we do look at it as a missed opportunity to go above them in the table because we have been playing well.

We could have nicked it at the end with Katie Stengel’s chance, but sometimes you have to give the opposition credit and I felt they defended their goal well.

Congratulations to Leighanne Robe, who made her 100th appearance for the club and played her part in us keeping the clean sheet.

I was delighted for Robey. She has had to be patient this season but she has been nothing but professional, she has got her head down and worked hard, and she should be really proud.

I’m pleased how she has come into the team, settled well and done well, and I’m delighted for her to get the 100 up, she 100 per cent deserves that and I’m proud of her.

Gemma Bonner is getting stronger each game she plays for us. She has been finding her feet getting back in the WSL and she is still getting to know her teammates and building relationships on the field.

We are playing in a slightly different way to what she was used to in her first spell with us but she is learning that and is a fantastic leader, she leads by example on the pitch and she is only going to get better for us.

We have spoken about our frustrations with the schedule a lot this season and we don’t play a competitive game now until we host Brighton at Prenton Park on Sunday April 23. It’s tough and it has been like this for the whole second half of this season.

We had a two-month break after Christmas then we played seven games in three weeks, then another month off, and now we’ve played three games and don’t play again until the end of April – it’s frustrating.

Obviously the FIFA window is there for the international break and then it’s the semi-finals of the Women’s FA Cup, but I don’t know why we don’t play on that cup weekend.

During this break I have arranged a few behind-closed-doors friendlies. Natasha Dowie and Melissa Lawley are back in training next week, which is great news, and they will be able to get some minutes leading into the international break.

We are still without our captain Niamh Fahey, who has a calf problem, and Leanne Kiernan but we’ve got these two friendlies arranged to keep everyone match-fit and give those players coming back from injury some much-needed game time. That will allow us to keep that momentum and to keep working on the things we need to work on.

I’d also like to update our fans on the progress of Rylee Foster.

Obviously Rylee has been working very hard on her long-term rehabilitation after her serious accident and she had just started a light session or two with our goalkeeping coach Joe Potts.

Her latest scan showed an issue which still remained following the car crash and so she had an operation on her shoulder this week. That’s been successful and now it’ll be another few months of hard work for Rylee in her rehabilitation and we all wish her well.

As always, thank you for your continued support.

YNWA,

Matt

Matt Beard was speaking to Liverpoolfc.com's Steve Hunter