Vilahamn on performance against Southampton and positive training camp | OneFootball

Robert Vilahamn reflected on a positive couple of days at Bisham Abbey as part of pre-season training camp, which was rounded off with a 2-1 victory over FA Women's Championship side Southampton on Thursday afternoon.

Martha Thomas grabbed her second goal in as many games as she cancelled out Rachel Rowe’s opener in the first half with a clinical strike from inside the box before Eveliina Summanen converted from the spot in the closing stages of the game to secure back-to-back victories in pre-season.

Further headlines from the game saw defender Clare Hunt, who joined us last week from Paris Saint-Germain, also handed her first appearance in Lilywhite and completed 45 minutes, while over 22 players continued to get match minutes as part of preparations for the 2024/25 Barclays Women’s Super League campaign.

Reflecting on the result against the Saints, Robert said: “It’s nice to come back and win the game, but the main thing was we had 22 players getting game minutes and we tried to use what we have worked on.

“We saw some glimpses of it but also some decision-making where we are quite tired now as we have train hard for the last three weeks. It has been a mixture of good stuff and stuff we need to move on from but, overall, it was a good fight from all 22 players.”

On the performance…

“Southampton pressed us high and we didn’t nail it until the second half, and that’s all about relations, self-confidence and patterns, it takes time to learn how to play with each other and we are using so many players, so it wasn’t easy to find new relations during the game.

“Then it’s out of possession, to find a way to press the opponent, and for the first 20 minutes, we can’t really get a good press on them but then we switched a few things and had a really good press for moments, so you can see that the players adapt to tactics that we give them and do it on the pitch, it shows we are on a good pathway because we want to be a high-pressing team and counter-attacks.”

On Clare’s debut and new signings…

“The new signings are settling in very quickly and you can see that they are good people, they like to hang out with each other but they also need to get to know each other when they play on the pitch together. For example, when Clare played centre-back, she had a lot of new relationships, so she was taking that step-by-step but there were also some misunderstandings. However, you can tell she’s very mature to dictate the game for us and I like that."

On the training camp…

“I think you need time together away from the pitch so you can get to know each other a little bit more, when you change environment, stay overnight and some social events, that’s small relationships in the squad building even stronger. We have achieved that on this camp and it has been a great four days, great food, good activities and strong training sessions.”

Watch - Vilahamn on growth shown in pre-season win over Southampton