In his press conference following Friday night’s win over Western Sydney, Glory women’s coach Stephen Peters admitted midfielder Georgia Cassidy hadn’t trained all week in the build up to the match.
Still, the 20-year-old retained her spot in the starting lineup and played a valuable role in Glory’s engine room as they controlled the first half of action.
Once she was taken off at half time, the Wanderers were able to work their way back into the contest as the Glory lost their fluency without her on the pitch.
Peters was full of praise for Cassidy post-match, commending her ability to bring other players into the game and to perform at a high level without being fully fit.
The Junior Matilda missed the first month of the season with a quad injury, and says the road to a full recovery has been challenging with other issues cropping up.
“Coming back has been a lot harder than I thought it would be,” said Cassidy.
“Trying to get my body right and having little niggles over and over again hasn’t been easy. Monitoring my body is really important. I’m not at the level most of the team is at with fitness but I think that’ll come easy when I feel good.”
After a slow start to the season, winning once in their first five games, the Glory have hit their groove and taken advantage of a nice spell at home, winning four of their last five.
“The first couple of games were an eye-opener for us, but we’ve learnt from that and the growth we’ve had over the past month has been very professional.”
Cassidy attributes part of their success to retaining the majority of the squad from the previous season, particularly the younger West Australian cohort.
“Keeping most of our players that live in Perth like Mischa [Anderson], Grace [Johnston] and even Ella [Lincoln] coming in has been very good for the team,” she said.
Another element to factor in is Stephen Peters. Cassidy says his eye for detail and fixing the one percenters is what makes him a good coach.
“He’s not afraid to tell you what you’ve done wrong. He’ll pick out the little things you’re not doing right and won’t let them slide.”
While the home form has been excellent, enough to surge into the top six, getting points on the road remains the kryptonite for the women’s team.
Heading into this week’s clash with the Mariners, the Glory are on a four game losing streak away, having conceded eleven whilst scoring just once.
Cassidy spoke about the preparation that goes into an away fixture, and how the team can turn their fortunes around when they travel.
“Usually we’ll have a day off at the start of the week and then we’ll train all the way up until we have to travel,” she said.
“We’ve not been really consistent in away games, but it’s definitely something we’re working on”.
“We can’t use travel as an excuse as to how we play. We don’t have the energy from the crowd but playing away from home is just a mentality thing. We need to push ourselves and each other.”
All images courtesy of Tom McCarthy.
