Nick Cushing praised the spirit of his side after their 3-2 comeback win against Birmingham City, but warned that mistakes which are costing goals need to be cut out.
READ: Match report | Birmingham 2-3 City
An own goal by Abbie McManus, which saw her lob goalkeeper Ellie Roebuck from the opposition half, and an early second-half Meaghan Sargeant header had put the home side two goals ahead.
However, three goals in the space of twenty minutes from Caroline Weir, Nikita Parris and Tessa Wullaert handed Birmingham their first FA WSL defeat of the season and saw City retain their own unbeaten start.
Despite the result, Cushing stressed the importance of preventing further simple errors from his side.
“You can’t win football matches when you give goals away and, although we’ve come back today, we have to cut out those mistakes,” he said after the match. “We’re almost giving ourselves a harder job by having to come from behind to get draws and wins.”
The match against Birmingham made it the second Women’s Super League game in succession where we had to come back from a two-goal deficit after our 2-2 draw with Bristol City in our first home game.
Nonetheless, Cushing was pleased with the overall performance and with City’s mentality over the past month, which has seen us play seven games over a three-week period.
He said: “I’d never question the spirit of the team. Against Bristol we were two goals down from two mistakes, the spirit was there. Against Atletico (Madrid) I thought (in the) second-half we were the better team, I didn’t question the spirit there.
“It doesn’t surprise me that, once we had the ball and control of the game, we created opportunities and earned a good win in the end.”
The City boss is also pleased with the direction of his side and with how they have responded to injury setbacks to the likes of Demi Stokes, Melissa Lawley and Nadia Nadim.
He added: “I think we’ve built a squad this year that is probably the most balanced team we’ve got for ability.
“That means when you do get those mini crises with (for example) Mel and with Nadia, you can rely on the other players and just shift the system a bit.
“I thought the team that went out today showed what a good team we are.”
Going into the international break, City find themselves in third place, just one point off league leaders Arsenal.
