Praise from a former top defender was much appreciated by Jayne Ludlow, particularly given that the Wales Women’s manager and her staff are stretched across all the national team’s age groups.
Ludlow’s tactical nous was singled out by Danny Gabbidon, who won 49 caps for Wales and was the guest speaker at the launch of the Football Association of Wales’ new identity for women’s football, Be.Football. The former Cardiff and West Ham player also spoke of the enjoyment that following the women’s team had given him.
“The senior national team is a priority but it takes up only a quarter of our job,” Ludlow says. “So when we get praise from Danny about getting things right tactically, it’s fantastic for all our staff. I think from an individual perspective and a staff perspective it would be nice for people to understand the difficulties we have.”
Spreading themselves thin is something the coaching staff will be confronted with again next month. “I’m thankful that we’re developing and growing in all areas,” Ludlow says. “Going into September we have the under-17 Uefa tournament and an under-19 Uefa tournament. The under-19 games run at the same time as the seniors and we have one group of staff. We want to be successful in all our roles, we want our youth team doing well, we want them pushing because that’s our future senior team. But there’s a limitation to what individuals can do and we have to split out priorities.”
The bonus is she does not have time to worry about the effects of the excitement building round the squad or that all their Euro 2021 qualifiers will be broadcast by the BBC and the scrutiny that brings.
“The role I have is so big I don’t have time to dwell on it. I’m going home tonight and I’m watching an under-19 camp game from last week and I’m prepping the performance squad sessions for next week. If it was just the national senior team, maybe it would cause me more of a problem because then I’d sit and think too much. We don’t have time to do that.
“In the future, do I hope the person sitting here answering your questions is solely a national team manager? Hell, yes. Because those teams we’re coming up against now – I can’t say categorically for Faroe Islands or Belarus – but I do know every other team we come up against in our group has a full-time senior national team manager.”
Being realistic is the theme of Ludlow’s views on Euro 2021 qualification. “I really enjoyed the World Cup,” she says. “I enjoyed it, seeing my sport, our sport, at the top level and seeing the interest it has now worldwide – it’s exciting. For us the challenge is to make sure we’re part of that in the future. The reality is it’s going to be tough. We have to step on the pitch and perform at our best for every 90 minutes that comes our way. And if we do? Then who knows?
“Nobody gives you a bye into those competitions. You have to do well in qualifying and you have to perform in every game. The reality is in the past we haven’t done that.”
The forward Natasha Harding and the midfielder Angharad James are more emphatic about their goal of qualification. They believe, and a 1-0 defeat of World Cup-bound New Zealand helped. “Jayne works hours and hours to make sure that whatever happens in a game we know what we’re doing from minute one to minute 90, and we all believe in that process and we’ve believed in it since she came through the door,” James says. “We know we are at a point where we believe we can qualify.”
Harding adds: “It’s taken a long time until we believed we could do it. To say: Right, OK, we might not have an abundance of multi-talented players; we haven’t, we’re a small nation. We have fantastic players but this is going to be the best way for us to qualify. It’s all results-based.”
Despite the loss of the injured midfielder and talisman Jess Fishlock, they believe the team – a mix of full-time, part-time and amateur players – have moved beyond a reliance on the full-time players. “Losing Jess will be a big blow,” Harding says. “But we’ve got a strong enough core that we’re able to deal with that now and we showed that against New Zealand. It’s hard to take but we have plans B, C, D, E, F, G.”
Wales drew 0-0 with England in World Cup qualifying last year but a 3-0 home defeat by the same opponents in their final group match ended their hopes of reaching the finals.
“The England game was hard,” says Harding of the goalless match. “That was one of the hardest games I’ve played in. It was wave after wave, cross after cross. We had a tactic of getting a point and we did that but that was hard.
“No disrespect to the Faroe Islands or anyone – we’ve been there, we’ve been the ones sitting back. England was just relentless.”
“Defending for your life for 90 minutes is a big ask,” James adds. “Scoring some more goals would be nice. Things don’t happen overnight, we’ve been building for years for this. It didn’t happen for us in the last campaign but we were close. We’ve taken all the disappointment from it coming down to that last qualifying game. No one expected us to get that far. And to draw against England away from home was massive.
“We’re now at the stage where pressure is on us for the first time because we should be qualifying now. We honestly believe as a group we’re good enough and we’ll be disappointed if we’re not.”
Wales start their Euro 2021 qualifiers on 29 August in the Faroe Islands before facing Northern Ireland at Rodney Parade on 3 September.
Talking points
• Manchester United have signed Swedish defender Lotta Ökvist from Hammarby IF. Ökvist has represented Sweden at under-23 level. She returned to Sweden after a difficult spell with Orlando Pride.
• North Carolina Courage’s manager, Paul Riley, has ruled himself out after the US national team manager job was vacated by Jill Ellis. “Been some conversation recently regarding USWNT job,” he tweeted. “Although flattered I am determined to continue the project we started in WNY & not interested in job at this time. NC Courage is amazing group & there is nothing like day-to-day development of players.”
• Three women are on the shortlist for Fifa’s Puskás Award for goal of the year. Cameroon’s Ajara Nchout, Utah Royals’ Amy Rodriguez and Northern Ireland’s Billie Simpson are in the running.
• Arsenal’s Jordan Nobbs made her return from an ACL injury by playing 20 minutes in a friendly against West Ham. She is set to play 45 against Tottenham on Sunday.
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