Sjoeke Nusken believes Chelsea’s dramatic victory over Aston Villa can give the team belief heading into the second leg of our UEFA Women’s Champions League quarter-final.
The Blues came out on the winning side of a seven-goal thriller in the Women’s Super League on Sunday afternoon at Kingsmeadow.
After falling behind early on, Sam Kerr, Naomi Girma and Lauren James fired us into the lead, only for Villa to hit back themselves and level the scores by half-time.
After the break we were frustrated in our search for a winner, until Nusken struck superbly to finish a fine team move in the 82nd minute.
It was a potentially crucial three points for Chelsea, taking us above Manchester United and Arsenal - who have two games in hand - into second place in the table, in a tight race for European qualification which looks set to go right down to the wire.
‘It was a really tough game,’ reflected Nusken. ‘I think we deserved in the end to win.
‘It was a good goal. I saw that Sam was getting the ball and I know she always looks around to see where someone is, so I expected that the ball was coming and was just very happy that it went in.
‘Of course it’s tough when you concede two goals in a short time, so I think we stood together as a team to get another goal.
‘We gave everything on the pitch and you could see that the league is so tough, every opponent is doing well, so it was an important win for us.’
The fact the Blues managed four goals in the 90 minutes – with all four provided by a different scorer – underlined the threat this team carries going forward. It was a timely reminder.
Being clinical in front of goal is exactly what we need to produce in our next game on Wednesday evening, when we host Arsenal at Stamford Bridge in the second leg of our Champions League quarter-final.
The Gunners lead 3-1 from the first game at the Emirates Stadium, but Sunday’s win gave the Blues further belief that they can turn the tie around on home soil.
‘I think we have a really good attacking line-up, we have a lot of good attackers, so I think it’s good that there were different goal scorers,’ continued our German international.
‘We can take from this that we can score a lot of goals. We scored four goals against Villa and that is important for Wednesday as well. We will try to get the positive energy from this match and then on to the next game.
‘I can’t wait to play at the Bridge again with our fans. I hope a lot of fans are coming to support us, we need them and we need a good performance.
‘It’s a big game for us. We will try everything to turn it around and I think we are in a good rhythm right now.’
A further boost was provided by the return to action for Chelsea of Kerr and her fellow Australian international Ellie Carpenter, following their involvement in the AFC Women’s Asian Cup, where they helped their country reach the final.
‘It’s so good to have them back. We have such a small squad at the moment because of a lot of injuries, so it’s very good to have them back, especially as they played really good again.
‘They give us confidence on the field. Sam in the box is always there and always dangerous so it’s good to have her back, and Ellie as well is always doing well.’
Plenty of reasons for the Blues to believe we can produce another dramatic come-back when we take on Arsenal on Wednesday then.