Renee Slegers has refused to get her Arsenal club from the title race of the Women's Super League, despite a 1-0 defeat against leader Chelsea Sunday.
Guro Reiten scored a penalty kick in the 84th minute after Kim Little Lauren James brought down in the penalty area when the title defender had ten points ahead of Arsenal, who then dropped to fourth place after the victory of Manchester United later in the day.
The Gunners currently only have a 0.3% chance to win the WSL title and face a huge task if they want to beat Chelsea, which according to the Opta-Supercomputer get a chance of 98.8% to retain the title .
“Well, of course there are now ten points between us, and that will be a much larger mountain to climb,” said Slegers, who was definitively appointed as head coach this month after an impressive intermediate period.
“We are very aware of that, but we also say that we had our briefs at the start of the season. You never know when other teams will slip.
“So what we want to do is just keep playing our matches and winning our matches, and that's all we can do.”
The Gunners had a brave fight against the hosts on Stamford Bridge, but the penalty kick, followed by a red card for Katie McCabe in the last ten minutes, destroyed their hard work.
“We knew it was important to us if we wanted to keep the spark in the title race to win, and we didn't do that. But yes, you never know what the future brings,” said Slegers.
Chelsea from Sonia Bompastor remains unbeaten in the competition with eleven victories and a draw from twelve games this season.
Arsenal also entered the game of Sunday undefeated under Slegers, since she replaced Jonas Eidevall, who resigned in October.
But the defeat against the leaders put an end to Arsenal's unbeaten streak of seven games, and they are fourth in the ranking, behind United and Manchester City.
“I am very happy with the series so far, because I have not lost the game. I think that says something about where we are as a team,” said the former Dutch international.
“I just think we played against a top team, we played a very exciting game and it would go one or the other. It could also have been a 0-0 match or a 1-1 match. So I think we have a sufficiently strong basis.
“I feel that, and I think the players feel that too. This happened, but that doesn't define us. Of course I am very disappointed. I wanted to win and I think we were close enough to get something.” From the competition, but then we will have to continue from here. “
Arsenal then plays a draw on Wednesday in the fourth round of the FA Cup against Bristol City before they visit Manchester City, which is one point above them on Sunday, in the WSL.
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