Battling performance from Spurs Women goes unrewarded against Everton

Spurs Women encountered only their second home loss of the season on Sunday (28 February) after a 3-2 defeat to Everton in the Barclays FA Women’s Super League at The Hive.

Valerie Gauvin’s early penalties were matched by Angela Addison and Gemma Davison’s goals either side of half-time, before Jill Scott’s winner wrapped up the three points for the visitors.

Rehanne Skinner made two changes to the side that narrowly lost 1-0 to Aston Villa three weeks ago (6 February), with Rosella Ayane and Esther Morgan replacing Cho So-hyun and the injured Ashleigh Neville in the starting XI. Morgan, 18, who was part of Wales’ senior squad during the recent international break, was handed her WSL debut.

Chloe Peplow, playing her first minutes since September, 2020, following a foot injury, returned to action when she came on as a substitute late into the second half.

We started boldly and almost went ahead after four minutes when Ria Percival brilliantly controlled the ball and launched Addison away on the break. She burst through on goal, but saw her effort thwarted by Danielle Turner’s last-ditch challenge. Moments later, Alanna Kennedy saw her header from the resulting corner flash just wide of the net.

Against the run of play, the visitors broke the deadlock from the penalty spot three minutes later. After Isobel Christensen’s shot connected with a Spurs arm in the box, Gauvin stepped up and tucked her penalty into the bottom right corner.  

Gauvin doubled Everton’s lead after 18 minutes, again from the penalty spot. The French international buried her second spot-kick of the afternoon into the bottom left corner.

We battled on and came remarkably close 10 minutes later when Kennedy received the ball from Kit Graham at close-range, but her chance spilled onto the far post.

Addison pulled one back for us 10 minutes before the break. Graham provided another pinpoint delivery over the top of Everton’s defence to Addison, who dinked the ball over Sandy MacIver with her left foot to secure her third goal of the season.

Our momentum continued to grow and two minutes into the second half we captured possession with excellent high pressure before Ayane went close, her shot collected by MacIver.

Davison’s equaliser came on the 57-minute mark. The midfielder held off the attentions of Nicoline Sorensen to win possession and create some space in the middle of the park before capping off a fantastic run by unleashing a strike from the edge of the area, which sailed past MacIver to draw us level.

Everton pulled ahead again four minutes later when Scott headed in Claire Emslie’s in-swinging corner at the near post. Aurora Mikalsen denied the Toffees a fourth with 15 minutes to play when she stunningly saved Hayley Raso’s shot one-on-one before confidently claiming the ensuing corner. 

Shelina Zadorsky, who returned from international duty with Canada in the SheBelieves Cup this week, saw her header deflected onto the woodwork with 13 minutes to play and Scott’s goal proved to be the winner in a physically challenging match.

The result means we drop one place to eighth in the WSL. We’re back in action next Sunday (7 March) when we visit Brighton at the Broadfield Stadium – kick-off is 2pm and the match is available to watch live on the FA Player.

'We deserved to get points out of the game'

Head Coach Rehanne told Spurs TV: "We showed a lot of belief and character today. We have come back from two goals down and obviously come back to a level playing field. Overall, we stuck to the game plan throughout the course of it, I was really happy with that and I think we deserved to get points out of the game from the way that we played."

Match data 

Goals: Spurs – Addison 35, Davison 57; Everton – Gauvin 7 (pen), 18 (pen), Scott 61.

Yellow cards: Spurs – Kennedy 18; Everton - Stringer 37, Clemaron 66.

Referee: Abigail Byrne.

Venue: The Hive, London.

Weather: Bright, nine degrees.

Attendance: Behind closed doors.