Carla Ward has praised Aston Villa’s ‘unbelievably good’ performance against Chelsea on Saturday.
The back-to-back WSL champions visited the Banks’s Stadium and came away with a 1-0 win, but Ward was mightily encouraged by her team’s showing against one of the best sides Europe has to offer.
“Unbelievably proud of the group,” stated the Villa manager.
“I thought they were sensational. I’m gutted for them because I felt we deserved a point, we had them rattled in the final 10 minutes.”
Villa did, indeed, put Emma Hayes’ side under considerable pressure during the closing stages on Saturday, and could’ve snatched a point but for some alert goalkeeping by Ann-Katrin Berger.
Ward reiterated her certainty that something could’ve been gained by those in claret & blue, but is equally happy to use this experience as a learning opportunity for her players.
“Before the game I said to the players that these are the games where we find out about you [as players].
“I’m proud of them and I don’t believe we deserved to lose the game.”
One individual who epitomised that level of pride was captain Marisa Ewers.
The German midfielder saw the start of her season interrupted by injury, something which continued when she was forced off during the first half of last month’s Conti Cup draw against Liverpool.
But the experience stalwart returned to line up alongside Remi Allen for the first time at the weekend and came in for some high praise from her manager.
“Maz has come back in and I thought she was brilliant,” said Ward.
“She hasn’t had many minutes, so it was a real shift from her to get to 60.
“People are starting to pose problems for us, and it’s a great position to be in.
“We’ve got to kick on now because that’s an unbelievably good performance. We’ve got to use that as a springboard.”