Arsenal head coach Jonas Eidevall admitted that he was disappointed with his side’s reaction to conceding the first goal in their Vitality Women’s FA Cup semi-final defeat to Chelsea at the LV Bet Stadium this afternoon.
The Gunners went down 2-0 to The Blues with Guro Reiten and Ji So-yun netting the visitors’ goals in the second half.
After a first half of few chances, Beth Mead missed a big opportunity for Arsenal early in the second period. Less than 60 seconds later, Chelsea were celebrating taking the lead through Reiten’s sublime 20-yard strike. When speaking in the post-match press conference, Arsenal boss Eidevall admitted that he was frustrated with what followed that decisive moment.
“Of course, it is better if Beth scores and we don’t concede at that moment but we can’t let a goal like that define our performance,” Eidevall said.
“That’s the most disappointing thing today and that’s where I don’t think that we gave ourselves a chance to get the result that we wanted. If we had carried on being disciplined and being consistent, carrying on the game plan, even if we were losing 1-0 and it wouldn’t have been enough today, we would have accepted a defeat of that manner and admitted that it wasn’t our day.
“If we want to be a winning team, we cannot be dependent upon scoring the first goal. Of course, it is an advantage to do that but still, we need to have the mentality of being consistent, carry on doing things right over and over again. We didn’t do that today and that was disappointing.”
When asked about the key differences in the game, Eidevall again reiterated the need for Arsenal to be more consistent in their performance and stay focused on the task.
He said “Consistency was the difference and quality in the deciding actions of the game. If we are going to beat a team like Chelsea, we need to be consistent and we can’t be dependent upon scoring the first goal.
“Even if they score the first goal, we need to be consistent and carry on playing because we showed in the first 40 minutes that we had enough quality to play against Chelsea and to beat them but we need to be better, it’s not the easiest thing but we need to do it.”
Arsenal return to action next Sunday when they travel to Everton in the Barclays FA Women’s Super League.