Sunday March 7, 2010
Boreham Wood, National Division
Arsenal Ladies 4-1 Rovers Ladies

A valiant Rovers Ladies performance ended in a 4-1 defeat after Arsenal turned on the style in the second-half.

The two teams were level at the break, after Natalie Preston (pictured) had cancelled out Rhiannon Roberts' early own goal.

But the Gunners found their shooting boots after the interval, with three goals coming in 20 minutes from Gemma Davison, Danielle Carter and Jayne Ludlow.

The home side opened the scoring in fortunate circumstances on 13 minutes when Rachel Yankey's cross was inadvertently directed into her own net by Roberts.

However, Rovers responded well and scored a deserved equaliser on the stroke of half-time, when Nicky Twohig headed against the underside of the bar and Preston forced the ball over the line.

Arsenal regained the lead just before the hour mark when a cross from the left landed straight at the feet of Davison, who fired the ball home first time. Carter added a third just five minutes later, before the substitute teed up Ludlow to secure the points with a shot from the edge of the box.

Danielle Sheen almost pulled a goal back five minutes from time, but the striker's glancing header from Lauren Walker's cross went just wide of the far post.

Manager Adam Lakeland said: "Arsenal are the champions and games at their place are always going to be tough. They might have lost a few players, but they've still got a lot of quality in their squad.

"There wasn't any pressure on us to win, we just wanted to give a good account of ourselves, which we did.

"I was quietly confident we could get a result and I felt we deserved to go in level at half time. We dealt well with what they threw at us for an hour, but fitness and physical levels took their toll in the last 30 minutes.

"We can take a lot of credit from the performance. We didn't fold or get a hiding like a number of other clubs have experienced this season. We matched them for an hour, which is a big plus to take into the Chelsea game this weekend. We will go into that game full of optimism and belief.

"I thought all 11 players, plus the substitutes, were magnificent, but I think that Nicole Emmanuel deserves a special mention. She really stood out in the first half. Considering that was her first league start in over 12 months, she is going to bring a hell of a lot to the table and that will help us no end between now and the end of the season."

ROVERS: Hill, Burke, Roberts, Twohig, Harding, Campbell (sub McDougall 70 mins), Shepherd, Preston (sub Sheen 78 mins), Ward, Emmanuel (sub Walker 70 mins), Anderton.

Subs not used: Carroll, Flynn.