Arsenal head coach Jonas Eidevall says that the club have massive respect for Reading ahead of this weekend’s meeting at the Select Car Leasing Stadium.
The Gunners are the early season pacesetters in the Barclays Women’s Super League and they come up against the team at the bottom of the table in their latest match.
When speaking to FAWSL Full-Time ahead of his side’s trip to Reading, Arsenal boss Eidevall said that the North Londoners have huge respect for The Royals while he believes that the Berkshire club are capable of turning their form around.
“I think they’re a hard-working team,” the Arsenal boss said. “We saw last season that they had a tough start to the season but I think they were one of the better-performing teams once they got going. They won a lot of games in a row.
“It’s an opposition that we have massive respect for and we’re preparing like it’s our most important game.”
Arsenal will play five matches in the second half of October, putting some physical and mental strain on the squad. Eidevall said that he expects high standards from all of his players regardless of how many games the club have or who is selected to play.
He said “Everyone always has a role to play. It’s just that the external persons might only see the players that are playing on the pitch. For me, the way that we prepare for a game, everyone has a role to play in the environment that we have, the meetings we have and what we do on the pitch together. That part is so important.
“When I speak about us being 100% and putting the team first, the games may be the fewest minutes we have together every week. Even the injured players like Rafa (Souza), Leah (Williamson) and Teyah (Goldie) – they all have big roles to play for the group in order to give, be supportive and be able to stay together here. We go through this whole block (of matches) as a group.”
Arsenal’s Barclays Women’s Super League fixture at Reading kicks-off at 6.45pm on Sunday evening.
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