Bristol City hold the one remaining unbeaten record in this season’s Barclays Women’s Championship but Crystal Palace forward Elise Hughes says that her side are focused on ending that run.
The two Barclays Women’s Championship heavyweights meet at The Robins’ High Performance Centre this afternoon. Crystal Palace can cut the gap between themselves and the current league leaders to just one point with victory in the South West.
With four wins and a draw from their five Barclays Women’s Championship matches so far, Bristol City are very much the ones to beat. When speaking to FAWSL Full-Time, Crystal Palace forward Hughes said that her side want to be the team that ends The Robins’ good record.
“They’ve obviously started the season really strong and that’s a credit to them,” Hughes said. “I think last season, they were really strong. They’ve kept a core group of players and have probably added a bit more quality.
“Credit to them for having a good pre-season and taking some momentum into the new season.
“We go into the game looking to win and hopefully, we can be the team that ends their unbeaten streak, so we will see what we can do.”
The two sides met in the group stage of the FA Women’s Continental Tyres League Cup earlier this month with Bristol City running out 4-0 winners. Hughes doesn’t think that you can take too much from looking at that result.
She said “It is difficult because you play a team so close together in a cup competition and then in the league. We didn’t perform on the day (in the Conti Cup) and the result matched that performance. I’d like to think that we won’t perform like that again.
“People from the outside can read into that result or Bristol could read into it but Crystal Palace are not reading into it. We are hoping to put in a better performance for a start and hopefully, the result will match.”
Crystal Palace’s 2-0 home defeat to Sunderland last weekend was one of a couple of surprising results in the Barclays Women’s Championship. Hughes said that the result is a reminder for the team about performing on the day.
“I’ve been luckily enough to play in the league for a couple of years now, so I know that’s exactly what is going to happen (unpredictable results),” Hughes said.
“It is a wake up call that you have got to be the team that turns up on the day if you want to take three points. If you don’t execute the game plan, if you don’t play with heart and desire, the team that comes and does that takes the three points.”
Crystal Palace’s Barclays Women’s Championship fixture at Bristol City kicks-off at 3pm.
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