Lathrope: “We’ll Make Sure We Learn From It”

Damon Lathrope is keen for his side to react in their upcoming games after defeat to Billericay Town in the FA Women’s National League Southern Premier Division.

A slow start cost the Golden Girls the chance to get back to within two points of league leaders Oxford United, with the Blues running out 3-2 winners at Grosvenor Vale in an action-packed clash.

The Hornets fell a goal behind shortly after a Gemma Davison drive was blocked by an Alex Baker save, with Holly Turner’s counter-attack ensuring the hosts would pay the price for their earlier missed effort.

This was followed by a spell of chances for the Golden Girls, but without really troubling the Billericay keeper. By the interval the visitors had stretched their lead to three goals through a long-range effort from Beau Parker and a well-converted penalty by Jess King.

A second-half fightback saw the Hornets fall just short of finding an equaliser, as Annie Rossiter and Davison’s strikes reduced the deficit to just one goal, but Head Coach Lathrope knows one result doesn’t define a team, with his side’s last defeat to Portsmouth in September kickstarting a free-scoring run of form.

“One result doesn’t define us,” Lathrope began. “It’s an opportunity to bounce back and we’ve had it before at Portsmouth, and we got a great response off the back of it. So, yes, we’re really disappointed, and we’ll look at it and make sure that we learn from it. But by no means do we overthink it, we can’t let it affect what we do next.

“It sort of highlighted a few things that we really needed to work on in that last defeat, and I feel like we may be falling into that little trap again. It might be a little bit of a wake-up call for all of us collectively to get back to the fundamentals, build what we do really well out of possession and then the opposition stuff will look after itself.”

Lathrope and his team were aware of the quality throughout the Billericay squad, and he gave them credit for their impressive performances, particularly in front of goal.

“We know they’re a good team and fair play to them today,” added the Head Coach. “We didn’t come into this game thinking it would be easy by any means, we knew they’re a good team.

“Sometimes you have to give the opposition credit. I thought they were good, had a game plan and executed it really well.”