Reading 0-3 Everton Women - Sun 4th Oct 2021

Blues boss Willie Kirk has praised his squad’s strength in depth as Everton secured their second win of the 2021/22 Barclays FA Women’s Super League season over the weekend.

The Toffees travelled to face Reading on Sunday with a depleted squad, with the likes of Nicoline Sørensen, Nathalie Björn, Lucy Graham and Simone Magill all unavailable.

However, the drop in numbers didn’t mean a drop in standards as the squad saw out a professional 3-0 win against the hosts.

A side that the Blues failed to beat in the league last season.

Kirk was left largely pleased from what he saw from his team on Sunday and spoke highly of the talent he had on the bench.

“Obviously, Nico [Sørensen] is out for the season we assume, and we had another three missing on top of that,” he told evertontv.

“It is looking a bit bare, but I think everybody who has come in has done a job.

“That’s why we needed a strong squad.

“When you have three or four out, the quality doesn’t deteriorate.

“You look at the subs we bring in; Bennison, Gauvin, Clinton, Pattinson, Finnigan.

“Courtney [Brosnan] hasn’t had any game time yet and she’s making Sandy [MacIver] the goalkeeper that you’re seeing this year.

“It’s fantastic quality that we’ve got throughout the squad and that will have to continue if we’re going to be successful.

“We’ll get players back, we’ll have more players get injured.

“There’s every chance we’ll try bring in one or two in January.

“That depth is critical to how we go about this season."

It was Everton’s first clean sheet of the season which was one of the many positives taken from Sunday’s result.

Now, Kirk has urged his players to build upon the defensive side of the game if they wish to be achieved something this season.

“Successful teams are built on clean sheets,” the manager added.

“We need a lot of clean sheets this season if we’re going to achieve what we want to achieve.

“That’s us got our first one [for the season].

“Now, all the focus has got to be on next weekend on Arsenal.

“Improving the performance again because we’ve improved it since that Birmingham game, but we need to improve it again.

“If we can keep a clean sheet against Arsenal, we know the worst-case scenario that it’s worth taking a point.

“That’s the beauty of clean sheets. Even if you’re not flying on all cylinders going forward, you know that you’re getting a least a point.”

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