Lucy Bronze insisted: “It’s good to feel the disappointment, so you know how it feels,” after the Lionesses’ showpiece World Cup send-off finished with more of a whimper than a roar.
Sarah Gregorius’s second-half goal for New Zealand spoiled the party in Brighton after Phil Neville’s side were made to pay for a possession-laden, slick-passing performance that was lacking any cutting edge. Worryingly, this was close to the forward line the manager would probably have started against Scotland on 9 June in Nice. But he was handed a performance that will give him serious food for thought.
“The scoreline might be frustrating but the performance wasn’t at all,” Bronze said. “We played some very good football. We created a lot more chances than we usually do but just didn’t put them away. One little slip-up and they scored. I’m not too frustrated. It’s a friendly, it’s a wake-up call and we know where we need to work.”
England ground out a 2-0 win against Denmark last weekend after a not altogether convincing performance. At the Amex they had the reverse problem. New Zealand could only fleetingly escape their own half while England’s crisp passing and high press was a world away from their battle against the Danes. Yet on the south coast they could not make a wealth of possession and chances in the first half count.
In the third minute Bronze raced clear on the right and clipped a ball over the top, a fraction too far ahead of an incoming Jodie Taylor. It was a sign of things to come.
With England’s best play coming down the right-hand side, New Zealand got out the tent pegs and set up camp. Fran Kirby chased down a ball back to Erin Nayler, the New Zealand goalkeeper was slow off her line but recovered to clear from the feet of the Chelsea forward. With less than 10 minutes gone England were through again. Taylor tried to dance round Nayler but the keeper clattered into her shins and she fell to the ground. Replays showed it should have been a penalty but, surprisingly, there were no appeals.
Neville cut a frustrated figure on the edge of his technical area, with Bronze, the closest player to him, bearing the brunt of his barked orders: “Lucy stay there, stay there” and “higher, higher, I want you higher!” he urged.
“I’m not deflated, you take your mood off the manager,” he said of his team’s performance. “If I’m happy, they’re happy. I’m totally relaxed about what I saw today.
“The only slight negative from my point of view was that they were crossing the ball too much. I wanted a little bit more composure and to pass the ball a bit more into boxes. Get Kirby, [Karen] Carney, [Beth] Mead or [Nikita] Parris on the ball and try and weave a goal rather than just putting the ball into the box.”
With almost comical defending keeping the Lionesses out, their lack of any cutting edge was even more pronounced. A short corner from Kirby found Alex Greenwood who swung a ball in, it deflected off a defender to the feet of Parris, who again whipped one in but the ball was hesitantly cleared.
As the first half ticked to a close it was England’s turn for some chaotic defending at the back during New Zealand’s first convincing attack. With red shirts blocking three shots, not all intentionally and the first winding Steph Houghton, Carly Telford was forced to pull off an acrobatic save to keep out a Betsy Hassett shot.
Five minutes after the restart England’s profligacy was punished. Rosie White collected Greenwood’s clearance and her shot was parried by Telford into the path of Gregorius, who fired the ball in.
“Their goal made us a little anxious in the final third and it felt as if the players were getting desperate,” said Neville. “We tried to get the message on to keep taking the passes but I actually thought the occasion and wanting to get back into the game so badly meant in the end we didn’t have enough to break them down.”
The Lionesses searched desperately for a morale-boosting reply but instead a World Cup warning was fired by the team ranked 19th in the world.
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