Jonas reacts to todays 2-1 win over Man City
Transcript
00:00 Jonas, you started Katie at right back today. I remember a couple of seasons ago you started
00:12 her there against Guru Raiten because you felt like having the left foot on that side
00:16 was handy in defending against her. Lauren Hemp, similar player, was that part of your
00:20 thinking today?
00:24 No, not really. But it could have been. My thinking about that was that I thought that
00:31 when we have played City before, I think we have been tricked into playing into wide areas
00:36 too quickly and I think they were really strong when they used the sideline as a defender.
00:40 So by playing Katie on the wrong side, I think naturally we get a lot more central tasks
00:47 out of that. And that makes us connect better and the longer we can stay central with the
00:53 ball against City and then playing the ball out wide later, I think that creates better
00:58 situations. I think there is a couple of situations in the first half when we used to play Alessia
01:03 and she then plays the ball out to Chloe Lacaz and it isolates into quite good one-on-one
01:08 situations, for example. And I'm pleased with that part. So no, it wasn't so much of a defending
01:14 for that, more attack.
01:16 And when you play City, I mean, obviously you need the ball to do anything, but sometimes
01:22 it feels like games are about possession and sometimes territory. And I wondered how much
01:26 this was about territory for Arsenal as much as anything.
01:30 I think we've become too low in the second half, too passive. I was quite pleased with
01:36 how we dealt with the defending crosses today. I think that has been a weakness of ours before,
01:41 but we did that much better today. But we concede too many crosses against Manchester
01:46 City and we do that because we get too low in our positioning in the second half. I think
01:51 first off, it's much better from a territorial perspective in the way we play.
01:56 But I think players are a little bit tired as well. They're coming back from international
02:00 break. So instead of trying to change that in the second half, that's why I brought in
02:03 Stina because I thought that's the way we're going to look for it. Instead of forcing and
02:08 maybe being too, what should I say, shallow inside if they try to, hollow is the word,
02:16 shallow. If they try to play inside, let's stay compact. But now when we win the ball,
02:21 we will have one of the best players in the world to run in behind. That proved to be
02:25 a good choice.
02:26 How important is the three points?
02:30 This boring answer is like for me, like any game in the league, it's super important to
02:34 get the three points. And I think that's where you sort of need to be just really consistent
02:41 in this. You can't be here and here and here. Are there things we can improve today? Yes.
02:46 There is. Are there things I'm really pleased with? Yes, there is as well. But we need to
02:51 go again first day against Bristol. So I think that's what has been pleasing with the group
02:56 is that we constantly develop a little bit, but we need to keep doing that. We're far
03:00 from a finished product.
03:01 In terms of the psychology of the team, it must be a bit of a boost for a win against
03:05 a big title rival like City at this point of the season when it's not necessarily on
03:10 the plan so far.
03:11 Yeah, yeah. I was a little bit surprised like with before the game to be honest to be, it
03:17 almost felt like we were portrayed as the underdog here. But in my experience being
03:24 here, we won three times out of three when I've been the Arsenal coach here against Manchester
03:28 City. This was the fourth victory out of four. If you include the Conti Cup, I think that's
03:34 a very strong record against Manchester City.
03:38 7-1, 1-9 here.
03:41 Not bad.
03:42 Did the first 15 minutes go to plan? Did you have to change anything?
03:49 First 15 minutes stressed me out. I don't think anyone tried to plan to lose the ball
03:55 in the way that we did here. It didn't surprise us the way that they played, but obviously
04:00 we can see our decision making is a little bit slow in that. And they get some touches
04:06 of the ball that could have ended really badly for us. So no, that didn't go to plan. But
04:12 happy that the players kept calm. We changed a few details onto it. So we started to play
04:17 our way much better out of their pressure. But no, that wasn't to plan.
04:22 You stopped a bit more from the guys playing with a bit more bite than maybe in the previous
04:37 game. Was that something that you think was really important in that second half, in particular
04:38 where it felt like the game was going into the valley?
04:39 Yeah, we spoke a lot about having a holistic performance and saying that it feels like
04:43 when you're playing against low blocks that it becomes very much a tactic towards football.
04:47 Like, "Here it's 3v2 here, here it's 4v3 and to move the ball." And we're like, "Yeah, that's
04:52 one part of football, that part." But football is also running, football is also dueling,
04:57 football is fighting for inches. Football is about having mental strength and saying
05:01 you fail once, but you're going to try your best the next time as well. So we spoke about
05:04 those qualities and saying like, "Those are equally important." And actually, this game
05:09 here is going to be easier to portray those things. They can also be done when you're
05:12 playing against a low block, but today it's easier to portray those things as a team and
05:18 understand that we need to do both. And in order to beat a team like City, you need to
05:22 do both. And I think we did. We wasn't perfect in any of them, but we were good enough in
05:29 both of them and the combination of that allowed us to win.
05:32 Just on those attributes, I think they were quite similar when BC here last season and
05:43 KSV, however you want to call it. So was that a performance you spoke about when you mentioned
05:49 those attributes?
05:50 It was. We had a nice little medley video clip of good moments against City here on
05:57 Meadow Park and what qualities we wanted to see. And that's both technical, but it's also
06:04 physical attributes. So a complete, holistic view on the performance.
06:11 Out of the performances so far this season, how do you feel about this one? Are you the
06:15 happiest or do you still think the previous games were better?
06:23 My honest answer to that is like one place where we have struggled lately against, for
06:29 example, have been Man United. I thought our display going here went a little bit under
06:34 the radar, for example, because if I compare our performance this year to last year, I
06:38 think we are much closer to win the game this year than before. So I think Dali games has
06:46 been so different because it's just been like low blocks. And we have interesting stats
06:51 where we compare all the teams in the league and we see by far we're the team that has
06:55 been playing against low blocks the most. And of course, that paints the picture in
07:01 a game. This is a very different game because it combines all different phases in football
07:07 and you need to be good at that. So I'm going to try and stay boring and grounded with this.
07:13 So you got the winning goal and then the game had to stop. What did you say to your team
07:20 about keeping the zone? That was a very unusual finish to a game.
07:23 Yeah, it was, but we changed formation. So we clarified the role on how that was going
07:30 to look. Then City changed formation, but we saw that before it started. So then we
07:36 could speak about that and we could clarify the roles again. And I think that's so important,
07:42 when you bring in so we can have that clarity. And I think we managed the game really well
07:47 the last 10 minutes. I don't think that was so stressful. It could have been worse.
07:53 Do you get any reaction to the news yesterday that Emma Hayes is leaving Chelsea at the
07:58 end of the season? Obviously, you and Emma have had some great battles over the years
08:01 and I'm sure will continue to do that this season.
08:04 No, I don't know the reason why she's leaving, but there's no doubt that she will leave a
08:12 legacy at Chelsea. I think a legacy that all football managers would be very proud of leaving
08:19 and she should be very proud of that. And one, I think me and all other managers are
08:26 going to try and make life at WSL as difficult and unpleasant for her as possible before
08:32 she leaves. And after that, I think she's going to be one of the first ones after the
08:38 season that I might pick up the phone and give a call to because I do think she has
08:41 some really interesting ideas about football and how to build a football team and so on.
08:47 And when you're not direct rivals, I would love to spend a little bit of time with her
08:52 and listening to her experiences at Chelsea and so on. But that phone call has to wait
08:57 and we have to remain competitors and hopefully she ends in a really bad way at Chelsea. But
09:04 that's not going to ruin her legacy anyways for that. And then best of luck for everything.
09:10 Thank you.
09:11 Any others?
09:12 Thanks everyone.
09:13 Thank you.
09:14 Thank you.
09:15 Thank you.