The Women's Rolling Football Thread season 2024-25

[DuncinToffee]

All ready for a brand new season ⚽💪

Previous thread

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/sports/4879827-the-womens-rolling-football-thread-season-2023-24

Thanks for the sympathy, DuncinToffee

Bad luck about yet another injury. Sometimes a spate of injuries can really bring out team spirit and raise the level of the whole team, so perhaps there will be a silver lining.

@MustTryHarderAndHarder my daughter follows all the insta and tiktok accounts and says the players don’t like him. Just hoping it isn’t too terrible tomorrow v Chelsea 😙

Yes, not really looking forward to it. At least we can get it over and done with early on and try and forget about it for the rest of the weekend.

Interesting, if she's right. Well, I say interesting, it's actually disastrous. Of course he won't be able to get consistent top performances out of them if they don't like him. Board needs to move quickly or our season and the Emirates project could go down the pan.

At least the Chelsea game looks like it will be better attended than Everton.

@Snowypeaks i was away last weekend so couldn’t attend but emailed to ask why my tickets hadn’t been sent. Got a reply saying the Everton match wasn’t included in the package I bought 😫. So all the people like me will be there this week! Have asked if I can upgrade but no reply. No reply to another query too re accessibility which is not a good look.

They have been great at marketing so it's a shame if they let themselves down when dealing directly with fans.
The home advantage, home advantage+, season ticket thing is quite complicated, as well!

Thoughts Gunners?

Jonas Eidevall has left Arsenal with immediate effect.

Renée Slegers will take charge in the interim as the club start the search for a new manager.

Inevitable, really. He is just missing something, and he obviously can't communicate with the players. He's very smart, he was a fantastic pundit, he just isn't a top coach. Doesn't have that connection with players that Hayes, or Wiegman or Bompastor or Beard have. Coaches have to be able to inspire devotion. And IMO he is lacking real belief in himself and that's why he does mad things or gets on players' nerves - he's always looking for a shield, or to deflect. He's both obstinate and indecisive. Massively overplayed Kim Little because she is his comfort blanket. On Saturday, she looked really fed up for the first time that I can recall - she is the ultimate professional.
It's good to rip off the plaster in one go. There is so much at stake.

Overall, my main reaction is relief. I've liked the look of Slegers from the start. She does seem to have a connection to the players - as far as I can tell from the outside, of course. So I hope she can repair us!

Edited to add:
Respect him for resigning, too. I actually like him, but he's not right for us.

Yes, I was really happy when I heard. I was worried it would turn in to another nasty Wenger situation.

I wonder if Arsenal inviting Emma Hayes to the match on Saturday made him realise that his days were numbered.

He always seemed under pressure as if he knew that he wasn't up to the job.

We had some great times with him, but overall we never got going. Improvements didn't stick. We were so inconsistent.

And now of course, I feel like crying again because of needlessly losing Viv!

I didn't know that Slegers was brought in this time last year. So Arsenal obviously had her lined up if Jonas didn't deliver.

I wonder if Emma Hayes is acting as a consultant.

Yes, I've always thought Renee Slegers' appointment was a sort of back-up plan, because JE was kind of on probation last season after we failed to get into the CL.

I hope Emma Hayes is not acting as a consultant - irrational of me because she is a top manager, but she seems to hate Arsenal so much, I wouldn't trust her!
Although...seeing her sitting next to Vic Akers was interesting. I've been wondering if her departure had something to do with Claire Wheatley, rather than Vic Akers. I have heard (gossip, obviously) that Emma wanted to take over from Vic and it was made clear that she wouldn't, and that was a big part of the why she left Arsenal. Seeing them together like that makes you think that if anyone was against that proposition, it wasn't Vic Akers.

Yes, Emma Hayes was another one who got away like Lauren James and Naz.

Also, Parris did really well for United but Jonas wouldn't play her.

I haven't heard of Claire weekly as I only started following the women after Jonas took over. What position did she have at Arsenal?

Glad it has happened quickly. Hope the team will get back on track this weekend.

Claire Wheatley is DoF at the moment - she has had different job titles, but always at the top or near the top of the AWFC hierarchy. Edu is now in overall charge of the women's as well as the men's side, though.

I don't necessarily agree about the players you mention being ones that got away, I'm afraid.
LJ's attitude stank - her time at Man United under the disciplinarian Casey Stoney was required to sort her out. And she has a nasty streak, which I don't think is very Arsenal.
Jessica Naz is a good player but I don't think she's quite Arsenal standard. Or what Arsenal standard should be!
Ditto Parris. And I don't like her personally, either. She threw Eni Aluko under the bus, totally unnecessarily, during the Mark Sampson debacle. She has a great goalscoring record, used to be compared to the incomparable Vivianne Miedema - but people forget that half of Parris's goals were penalties, and Viv hardly ever took penalties.

So, sorry to disagree, but that's football, isn't it? 😁

No problem at all with you disagreeing. You have followed the women's game for far longer than I have and have much more knowledge.

You are correct about LJ, she has got a nasty streak and could have caused problems but it makes me wonder how Chelsea manage to consistently do so well in spite of her.

I didn't know that about Parris.

From what I have seen of Naz, I thought that she would have done well at Arsenal.

Naz is a fast, direct forward so we could do with a player of her type, definitely, since Lina Hurtig has barely played through injury. But the pressure is much greater at Arsenal and players are required to go out of their comfort zone a lot. I may be wrong, of course, and I don't mean to suggest that Naz doesn't have extra strings to her bow. All I can say is that we haven't regretted willingly letting any young player go - so far. Chloe Kelly and Ruby Mace were two players that we really wanted to keep but they wanted to play first team football immediately, which is fair enough and has worked out for them both.

I just heard Kim Little on the news and she didn't seem shocked or upset.

I wonder if they knew that if they didn't win on Saturday then he would probably go and that it influenced their play.

Tomorrow's match will be very interesting.

@MustTryHarderAndHarder agree and very pleased have just got tickets. Not sure if they only released certain sections of seating, but not that many seats available. My daughter is v happy to see the first game of the new era.

Hope that you both enjoyed it.

We deserved to win, but we had to work for it.

Lots of pretty passing triangles; first half I was worried as usual inability to shoot. Better in second half. Hats off to the away fans who were incredibly loud and enthusiastic!

We got through it. Flattered a little by the scoreline, but on the other hand we were unlucky on Sunday.

Too soon to conclude anything about Slegers, nothing was going to change in three or four days with 2 matches to play, but I can say I like her, at least.

Yes, she seems like a decent person.

We just couldn't score for toffee today, frustrating watch as I think we didn't deserve to lose