‘There’s a lot on the line’ – Everton boss Sørensen looks ahead to West Ham United fixture | OneFootball

Everton manager Brian Sørensen says that this weekend’s Barclays Women’s Super League fixture against West Ham United is a hugely important game for both clubs.

The Toffees travel to The Chigwell Construction Stadium to take on The Hammers on Sunday afternoon.

Everton go into the game in 10th position in the Barclays Women’s Super League table while opponents West Ham United are bottom. With points being in high demand, Everton boss Sørensen admits that there’s a lot on the line in East London.

“They are very similar to us, it’s just small margins to get a win,” Sørensen said when commenting on West Ham United in the pre-match press conference. “They should have won the game against Leicester last weekend and we should have beaten Leicester when we played them. It’s these really small margins that you have to get on your side.

“I think they are a good team. They have a front-three that are really good and I haven’t figured out why they haven’t been scoring more goals. They scored a lot of goals in the [League] Cup last night, so we know that those players can find a way to the goal. 

“It’s about being ready for the challenge. They will do everything they can to get a win and we will do the same. I hope it’s an exciting game but I can imagine that both teams may have a few nerves because there’s a lot on the line.”

Injuries have played their part in Everton’s tough start to the season. Sørensen says that the club are not happy with their current league position but believes that results will come with time and better player availability.

He said “No, we are not happy with where we are in the table for sure but sometimes, there’s stuff that you can’t control. When you look at the injuries, percent-wise, it’s much more than any other team. We’ve had key figures out and so on.

“We have to deal with that, keep building the team and I think the progress has been good. Results-wise, not so much.

“I can see the team are believing in what we are doing and they are working extremely hard on the pitch. The staff are working extremely hard to ensure that the players are ready and available.

“It will come. I’ve said it before that we need consistency and we haven’t had that at all. It’s also about me figuring out how to integrate the new players. It’s hard when you get nine new players in and seven or eight of them are starting straight away. That’s been more challenging than I expected but we are where we are and we just have to keep trying to grind out some wins.”

Everton will go three weeks without a league fixture after this weekend and Sørensen admits that this lay-off is much needed.

He said “I would like a break so that we can get players back. We’re without Maz [Pacheco] at the weekend, Hikaru [Kitagawa] can’t play 90 [minutes] yet, so we have to find a way to solve that problem. The centre-backs; Rion [Ishikawa] did 90 [minutes] this weekend which is more than we would have liked but we had to make changes elsewhere.

“We are still building the fitness of the team and three weeks without a WSL game will come in handy.”

Everton’s Barclays Women’s Super League fixture at West Ham United kicks-off at 12pm on Sunday afternoon.