Liverpool manager Matt Beard says that his side have developed the right mindset to be successful in the top flight this season.
The Reds will contest their first Barclays Women’s Super League fixture in two-and-a-half years this evening when champions Chelsea provide the opposition at Prenton Park.
The step up from Barclays Women’s Championship to Barclays Women’s Super League will be tough for Liverpool but manager Beard believes that they are in a good place mentally to succeed.
“We’ve worked incredibly hard in pre-season on different moments,” Beard said when speaking in the pre-match press conference. “Last year, we went on that run of 20 games unbeaten and we kept going but we know that potentially won’t happen this year.
“We’ve done a lot of work in the classroom on the psychological side about resetting – if we do get a negative result, we’ve got the next game that we can potentially get points from. We’ve done a lot of work in the off-season, we’ve worked on our defensive strategies, more-so than we did last year, but we had a lot of the ball last year. It’s about adapting for the opposition that we will play against because we might not have as much of the ball this year as we did last year.
“We’ve got to find different ways of winning football matches. We’ve concentrated on that in pre-season and we are really pleased with the work that we have done. We’ve been pleased with the results in pre-season but playing for points is different to working and learning.
“We are looking forward to the challenge. We do feel that we are equipped for the division but there are going to be ups and downs this year because of the way that the Super League has grown.”
Chelsea will be the favourites to collect the three points on Merseyside this evening but Beard believes that Liverpool will give everything to put on a good show for a bumper home crowd.
He said “You’ve got to play them at some time. They are a fantastic team, they’ve won the league three years on the spin so that tells you all that you need to know.
“We’ve had a good pre-season where we’ve played top opposition like Manchester United who are targeting those European spots, we’ve played against Manchester City, so we’ve given ourselves a good learning curve.
“We know that it’s not going to be easy, especially with the players that they’ve brought in during the summer, but we will be setting up to get something out of the game. I am confident that we can give a good account of ourselves and let’s see what it brings.”
Liverpool’s Barclays Women’s Super League fixture against Chelsea kicks-off at 5pm this evening. Tickets remain on-sale and can be purchased by clicking here.