ReactionMatt Beard on Arsenal defeat: 'We're frustrated with the result'
Matt Beard conceded his frustration at Liverpool FC Women’s narrow 1-0 defeat by Arsenal in the Barclays Women’s Super League.
The Reds were beaten at St Helens Stadium on Sunday afternoon, with Alessia Russo’s 20th-minute goal deciding the contest.
For Liverpool – who continue to battle a raft of injury absences – it meant they signed off for the Christmas break with a loss in the top flight.
Beard, however, saw positives in the game from his team despite annoyance in failing to take any points in the contest with the Gunners.
“I think we’re frustrated with the result,” the manager told Sky Sports post-match. “We put a lot into the performance today and I think if you look at the goal, we’ve lost the game on a set play.
“From our end, our standards in both boxes are generally really good, so to lose it with that is frustrating.
“I’ve just said to them that we’ve had a lot thrown at us in the first half of the season with the injury situation that we’ve had and decisions going against us.
“So, to finish off with a committed performance like that, albeit not the result we wanted, is a positive that we can take into the New Year.
“Hopefully come January when we’ve got our first friendly back after the New Year, we’ve got everyone back fit apart from maybe Faye Kirby and Sofie Lundgaard, who is out for the season.”
On whether he has seen an upturn in performances despite recent WSL results, Beard added: “We’ve had one bad game, against Man United, in the sense of where we didn’t have our standards in our work-rate.
“Like I said, you take three players out… we’ve had seven or eight players missing and at one point it was nine. So, if you take those out of a small squad already, it’s going to have an effect.
“We’ve done the best with what we’ve had available and the players deserve credit for obviously having to go through changes week in, week out.
“We can look back on this as a big learning curve and make sure we don’t repeat the same injury issues we have had and make sure we have a fully-fit squad to choose from. When we are fully fit then nine times out of 10 we win games.”
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