The City skipper grabbed her first goal of the season as we cruised to a 6-2 win over West Ham United.
The fact that Houghton was also celebrating her birthday added to what was already a memorable evening for the defender.
Reflecting on his captain’s performance Taylor highlighted her importance to the cause both on and off the field.
“We appreciate her being here, we know she won’t be able to go on in a playing capacity forever but at the moment she’s contributing really highly on and off the pitch,” he explained.
“We’re really pleased to have her, and I think she’s playing some of the best football we’ve seen, she’s playing really well.
“It goes without saying what she brings as a personality around the place.
“She’s great for this young group of players we have.
“We don’t have loads of experience beyond Laura Coombs, Steph and Demi (Stokes). Having that is crucial.”
Victory for City moved us up to second in the table, extending our unbeaten home run this season in the process.
And the boss believes that we played some of our best football when taking the game to the opposition.
He said: “When we were aggressive tonight, it’s where a lot of our good play was, winning the ball back and taking control of the game.
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“I was impressed, good stuff and lots in the game… but the pleasing thing was we got the three points ultimately and improved on the goal difference.
“I’m pleased with the victory, of course it’s important at this stage of the season.
“I’m pleased with the amount of goals we scored, we played some good stuff in periods, but surrendered a bit of ground to West Ham a little unnecessarily from our point of view.”
