Here’s a team of the week for Matchday 19, comprising the games played on the 17th, 19th, 20th, and 21st April 2024. Getting into the home stretch now, lotta last chance saloons coming thick and fast up top and down low. Something’s gotta give…
GK: Courtney Brosnan (Everton)
LB: Leila Ouahabi (Manchester City)
CB: Kadeisha Buchanan (Chelsea)
CB: Leah Williamson (Arsenal)
RB: Ashley Lawrence (Chelsea)
CDM: Yui Hasegawa (Manchester City)
LM: Lauren Hemp (Manchester City)
CM: Jess Park (Manchester City)
RM: Missy Bo Kearns (Liverpool)
CAM: Beth Mead (Arsenal)
ST: Khadija Shaw (Manchester City)
Another week, another slew of Manchester City players making a team of the week. Their dismantling of West Ham was uncompromising, they simply didn’t allow them to play, well perhaps fleetingly, but the likes of Leila Ouahabi quickly stamped them out, and not just with her goal inside thirty seconds. Yui Hasegawa was once again the conductor in the middle of the Manchester mechanism and with the mercurial Lauren Hemp and unstoppable Jess Park feeding the storm that is Khadija Shaw, who was… Good lord — maybe the best striker going in the game today. In front of Shaun Goater she led the line like a GOAT — feed The Bunny and she will score. Laia Aleixandri and Alanna Kennedy were unlucky to miss out for The Citizens but their two title rivals put up the numbers in central defence, with Kadeisha Buchanan and Leah Williamson pulling the strings that garnered respective 3–0 victories from the back (and occasionally further forward). Chelsea and Arsenal also have one more representative each, with Beth Mead and her brace once again making the game look like a cakewalk from The Gunners, while Ashley Lawrence didn’t give Villa any quarter up and down the right wing. Arsenal can count Manuela Zinsberger and Steph Catley in their standouts (albeit without cigar), while Chelsea can throw mighty plaudits the way of Niamh Charles and Aggie Beever-Jones.
For the opponents of the title contenders, West Ham didn’t have time enough to get someone on the playbill. Villa’s WSL debutant Sophia Poor looked assured as an early replacement, and Leicester Yuka Momiki looked the most likely source of danger against Arsenal, despite nothing coming of it.
The week’s other three games saw Liverpool earn an ultimately narrow win over Bristol City that once again sees the latter left off this list. Liverpool can count Lucy Parry and Marie Höbinger close, but Missy Bo Kearns ran the show across the midfield and going up for The Reds. That victory puts Liverpool ahead of Manchester United in the league who played out a dramatic draw with FA Cup Final opponents Tottenham. The two finalists cancelled one another out, with playmaker in white Matilda Vinberg and super-sub, certain Man U player of the season Lucia Garcia being the stars of the respective shows, the latter especially changing the game necessarily for her team. Finally, Everton and Brighton engaged in an engaging engagement that displayed both the strengths and shortcomings of the two sides. Each managed two noteworthy performances, The Seagulls with the industrious Katie Robinson and Poppy Pattinson, while The Toffees put up the everstrong Megan Finnigan and the long-consistent Katherine Møller Kühl. But it is Everton who give the final member of the eleven this week with Courtney Brosnan staking her claim as the safest hands in the league with yet another powerful display between the sticks.
Player Of The Week is Khadija Shaw. Can’t imagine I’m getting much pushback on that one. In one half of football, she somehow managed the complete striker’s performance (maybe when extrapolated). Five nominees for Goal Of The Week — Aggie Beever-Jones’ crackerjack volley is third, Höbinger’s sweet strike is fourth, Shaw’s strong first is first, Naz’s poise is fifth, and Mead’s well-built first is second. For those keeping count at home, Khadija Shaw has done the double in the game and in this article. If I do get to a Save Of The Week, Anna Leat’s sending off save was pretty fire, but aye, ya cannae just do that.
Keep it streets ahead,
C.L.R.
