Martin Ho says ‘we were nowhere near our level’ as we suffered a 2-1 defeat to Everton in the Women’s Super League on Sunday afternoon.
We were punished after a slow start at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium as Yuka Momiki picked out the bottom corner with a low, left-footed drive and the visitors, who arrived in north London on the back of three consecutive wins in the WSL, kept us at bay to limit us to very few opportunities while Lize Kop produced a number of key saves to keep us in the contest.
However, on 76 minutes, a moment of quality from Signe Gaupset brought us back on level terms but, despite the momentum shift in our favour, the visitors regained the lead with seven minutes left on the clock, Kelly Gago tapped home from close range.
Returning from a three-week absence of action due to the international break, our Head Coach acknowledged the performance wasn’t what is expected from his group of players.
“We were nowhere near our level that we need to be,” Martin Ho told us, speaking to SPURSPLAY after the game. “I need to dissect that and make sure that I look at that performance with a really, really close eye because of how we set up and the way we do things tactically - that's my responsibility.
“We have to make sure that physically, technically, we need to be a lot more clean with those actions. Usually, our pressure and our aggressiveness defensively is there but, today, we just didn't get up to the levels we expected.
“They've kept a lot of clean sheets. They don't concede many and they've come off the back of three straight wins. We need to make sure that when we're in these games, we know it's going to be competitive, the fine margins matter.
“When we have our chances in and around the box, we need to be more ruthless. Signe took her goal really well but, in the game, in both phases, we weren’t where we need to be and we were not near the level we needed to be. If you're not at that level, you won't be able to perform at the top level.
“We were nowhere near the level and that's my responsibility. We need to make sure that when we go into this Manchester City game now, we can repay that faith in the fans.”
We now face Manchester City at Joie Stadium next weekend to start a run of three consecutive away games against the three of the top four – Arsenal and Chelsea in the FA Cup – and Martin is clear he wants to see a reaction from the defeat in north London.
“We should see a response now,” Martin added. “There should be a raising character and intensity going into the training week. There should be a real clear eye on individual reflection for myself, for every player, for staff, and we need to make sure we go into that Manchester City game with the right mindset and with a positive mentality to make sure we can push the game.”