Tottenham Hotspur took a bonus point from their Subway Women’s League Cup match against Aston Villa – and Martin Ho gave a lot of credit to goalkeeper Lize Kop.
With the score at 0-0 after 90 minutes, the competition rules say that a penalty shoot-out decides who gets an extra point to take into the group standings.
And Kop not only stopped two penalties, she had the nerve to step up and take one as well.
“Penalties are the cruellest way of deciding games,” Ho told the club’s official website afterwards. “I don’t envy anyone in those situations – I don’t even enjoy watching them!
“But the players who stepped up showed real courage and personality. It’s a pressured moment, and I’m proud of them. Lize made two brilliant saves and even scored a penalty herself – she’s effectively won us the game.”
The score in the shoot-out was 7-6, with Sarah Mayling, Anna Patten, Jill Baijings, Oceane Deslandes, Lynn Wilms and Lucia Kendall scoring for Villa, and Kop making crucial saves from Miri Taylor and Georgia Mullett.
Indeed, if Taylor had managed to get past Kop with her spot kick, Villa would have won the match, as Spurs’ Lenna Gunning-Williams had the first penalty of the shoot-out saved by Ellie Roebuck.
But the seven team-mates that followed her did not miss: Bethany England, Amanda Nilden, Matilda Vinberg, Eveliina Summanen, Drew Spence, Kop and Toko Koga.
Villa had one less penalty taker to choose from after Noelle Maritz’s late red card reduced them to ten players.
Martin Ho: We need to be more consistent going forward
Reflecting on the match during normal time, Ho described it as “a scrappy game”.
“In the first half, we created some good moments but maybe lacked a cutting edge in the final third,” he said.
“In the second half, we got into some good positions, but the final ball or action was a little off. When we got it right, we found good shooting and crossing positions. We just need to make that more consistent.
“Clean sheets are important – they give you confidence. But we still need to defend the goal better because they had some big moments. Our pressure also needs to be a bit more aggressive and consistent. This performance was the response we expected. The players would’ve felt the City defeat, and hopefully tonight has taken that out of their system so we can now move on to Leicester City.”