Saturday's clash with Aston Villa saw us take the lead after 11 minutes through Lauren James, but after our 34 shots on goal, we could not add to the lead, and the visitors scored an equaliser with 10 minutes to play.

Our new No.9 Malard scored a brace in our 5-2 win over Real Sociedad at Plough Lane in our first competitive match of the campaign but was absent for the second leg of that tie and again today.

'Melvine picked up a knock in training, so she should be back soon,' Bompastor confirmed. 'But at the same time, it's difficult to have a more precise timeframe for her return. For sure, if you have more availability in the squad with some profiles, it always helps.

'I didn't have a number nine on the bench today, someone who plays in that position and has a lot of experience, so that's the reality. But today, for me, if you analyse the game and the performance, we created enough chances to be able to score in different ways.

'Many players in the squad had the opportunity to score. The goalkeeper had a really good game. She made a lot of big saves. That's the reality. But I still think we could've done better with some of the chances we created.'

Aston Villa's debutant goalkeeper Akane Okuma made a series of fine saves throughout the match, and Keira Walsh had her brilliant effort bounce down off the underside of the crossbar and out again. Yet Bompastor wasn't looking for excuses as she explained the areas in which she wants the team to improve.

'If you analyse the performance today and the statistics of the game, you could say it's crazy we didn't win the game,' she said. 'We created a lot of opportunities.

'The reality of football is that in this kind of game, we need to be two or three-nil up by half-time, and the game is over. Then, it's a completely different game coming into the second half because when you have two or three goals difference, you can bring players in, rotate the squad.

'Being only one-nil up, you can always be exposed, so you try to find the balance between keeping the attacking style, but also avoiding the transition and the situations for Villa. So we focused a lot on that in the second half, but it was not enough.

'In terms of mentality and mindset, I spoke before the game about the fact that when you play these games, a one-nil lead is not enough. You need to keep the momentum. You need to speed up the game as quickly as possible, and you need to sustain that. You need to make sure you accelerate to kill the game because when you are only one-nil up, you don't kill the opposition.

'So that's what happened today, and at the end of the game, we were all frustrated because it's not a good result, and I think we had the opportunity today to win the game, kill the game, and many more things.'