Matt Bevans faced the media after the Golden Girls fell to a 1-0 defeat against Sheffield United at Bramall Lane.
In their first outing since February 4, an early Tara Bourne header, deflected in by LucÃa León, was enough to condemn Watford to defeat.
Read what the Assistant Coach had to say below…
His feelings at full-time:
It was always going to be tough, us not playing for six weeks. I thought we actually started okay, but they then got on top. We asked for intensity from the off, but we were a bit sluggish. We were arriving too late, and we allowed them to get on top.
We went in at half-time, asked for a positive reaction and some changes in the way we wanted to do things, and we got the reaction second-half, and had chances to go and get the equaliser.
On the side's response to going behind:
I’ll be honest, I’m really proud of the team’s resilience and determination to stay in the game when it is tough. We are a bit depleted at the moment - we had four fit players on the bench.
We are missing key players, and for them to stick into it, and stick to what we asked them to do is a credit to them. It is a game of chances and we talk to the girls all the time in training, [telling them] you might only get one chance a game, and when that comes you have got to take it.
[It was a] game of few chances I think, we limited them, they limited us, but we have had two great chances to score.
On the importance of playing again:
We needed the game - to go six weeks without a game is crazy. We have done as much as we can in training, [but] there is nothing like being under the lights playing a game, to get minutes into the legs.
On Sunday’s showdown with second-bottom Lewes:
I’m quite honest with it, it is a big game on Sunday, and we need to go there and put on the second-half performance we did today at Lewes. We are ready for Sunday, we will dust our wounds today and be ready to go.
On injuries to goalkeepers:
We will have a goalkeeper. We haven’t even touched on that situation, that we’ve had to put the goalkeeper coach [Sophie Harris] in goal today, because I don’t like making excuses and I tell the group that as well.
I don’t want excuses, but we are having to deal with adversity at the moment, and I am proud of the way they stood up. Gutted we didn’t get anything from the game, but we will have someone [a goalkeeper] in place for Sunday.
