Manchester Metropolis’s hopes of catching Chelsea within the Girls’s Tremendous League (WSL) title race had been significantly dented on Sunday as Everton claimed an unlikely 2-1 victory at Walton Corridor.
Everton transfer out of the relegation locations with the win, whereas Metropolis’s failure to captalise on Chelsea’s first dropped factors of the season at Leicester Metropolis on Saturday leaves them six factors behind the reigning champions.
The defeat was made worse for Metropolis as two of their rivals for the Champions League locations each received, with Arsenal downing Liverpool and Manchester United edging previous Crystal Palace.
Everton had by no means picked up factors in opposition to Metropolis within the WSL earlier than Sunday’s conflict however Brian Sørensen’s gamers confirmed no indicators of psychological scars, flying out of the blocks and creating quite a lot of probabilities in a breathless first half.
The strain instructed after 31 minutes as Sara Holmgaard dinked a ball into the penalty space from the correct flank and Lucy Hope guided a header previous Khiara Keating to provide the hosts the lead.
The benefit was then doubled as the primary interval drew to its shut. Honoka Hayashi discovered area contained in the field and noticed her shot deflect into the bottom-left nook to depart the guests shell-shocked on the break.
Gareth Taylor’s Metropolis aspect emerged for the second half with renewed vigour and Courtney Brosnan was compelled into motion on quite a lot of events within the Everton web.
Jill Roord and Lily Murphy each went shut however the deficit was solely halved within the 89th minute after Karoline Olesen introduced down Yui Hasegawa within the field and Australia striker Mary Fowler thumped dwelling the resultant penalty.
That made for a nervy near the sport however Everton held out to spark jubilant celebrations on the full-time whistle.
In the meantime, at St Helens stadium, Alessia Russo‘s first-half purpose from a nook was sufficient to see off Liverpool. Mariona Caldentey hit the publish with a penalty for the guests however Renee Slegers’ aspect proved tough to interrupt down for Liverpool and now transfer to only one level behind Metropolis within the WSL desk.
United travelled to southeast London to play Crystal Palace and returned dwelling with all of the factors after Grace Clinton helped herself after the Palace backline handed their approach into bother. Marc Skinner’s workforce are fourth, degree on factors with Arsenal.