💬 Anna Moorhouse: "I'm really happy to achieve that" after breaking NWSL shutout record

Orlando Pride Head Coach Seb Hines

Opening Statement

“Very much in the moment, I don’t think we played to our best. I don’t think we were threatening as much as I would have liked us to be. To come away from a difficult environment, with Bay FC doing really well in the last couple of games and having shown what they are capable of doing, one-nil win away from home, I will always take [it]. We will always take the three points. It is so critical at this stage of the season that we continue to pick up valuable points. There are still a lot of things that we can continue to work on. I said to the players before the game that it is important that we still learn, even though we are unbeaten and still winning games, that we still have learning moments to continue to progress towards the postseason.”

On what contributed to the team not playing their best

“I just think that right now it is getting more challenging. Teams are doing different strategies to play against us. Last week against KC, they were a lot more low block with no real space to exploit. Today, similar but a little bit higher with Bay FC trying to be compact, trying to force it wide and we have to learn from that. We have to continue to be threatening in those moments. In possession in the first half, I thought we didn’t really get our press right. I didn’t think we were as aggressive as we have shown in previous games. There was a big change in the second half. I thought we looked more like ourselves. I thought there were moments where we were a little more aggressive with our press and forced it wide. Wone some balls in the midfield and looked to transition forward quickly, and I thought some of the buildup play was really good. We created more opportunities in that second half and looked more like ourselves.”

On adapting to how teams play against them

“We don’t want to be too different. We look at the core moments in the game, I think a lot of our game model is heavily reliant on transition. We have some really good players who can be threatening in transition. I think defensively we have been really good all season long. I think the attacking side and the buildup moments are where once we get in that final third, can we be a little bit more threatening? Can we find that final pass? Can we find a little separation one-versus-one or even get some shots off? I think that is just being adaptable. You want to be good at eveyrthing and you want to be good at all moments in the game and we will continue to learn from it. We are still only two years into this Pride era, and we are doing phenomenally well right now and we will continue to just work on it. We made some changes as well going into this game. We want to make sure the players are feeling fresh towards the last five games of the season. We wanted to freshen it up and I feel like players like Carson [Pickett] coming in and Julie [Doyle] coming in was really beneficial. We allowed players to get some well-deserved rest also. I have always said it has been a collective game. It is about the roster, and it has allowed us now to be more flexible with our team selection, which is great to see.”

Orlando Pride Forward Marta

Opening Statement

“Of course, we are really happy. That was our first goal this year to get back to the playoffs and to play at home. It is the best with the support and the atmosphere we have every single game at home. I am really happy with that. We are going to go for more. Our second goal is to win the shield and then we are going to work hard to win the next games also.”

On the back-and-forth game

“First, we didn’t play our best game today, but it was enough to go home tomorrow with three points. We have things that we need to do better to continue to improve and develop this team more and more with the young players, too. We need to be a little bit better when we play against a team that runs back so fast and parks the bus around the area. We had the ball most of the time there, but we maybe didn’t have the patience to wait for the best option and explore the situation better to find the right balls.”

On the team not giving up

“We didn’t start with the team that we normally start with, but the players that came in showed up and helped a lot. I think we need to just keep trying to do our best because sometimes we are going to have players not show their best in the game. I don’t think I showed my best in the game tonight. I don’t think some players did, but at the end we found a way together to fight for the result. It is going to be like that because everybody is going to be looking to beat Orlando now and we need to deal with this situation and go over and keep strong both mentally and physically like we have always shown from the beginning of this season.”

Orlando Pride Goalkeeper Anna Moorhouse

Opening statement on the match and clean sheet record

“It was a tough game for us. Bay definitely improved from the previous time that we played them back at our stadium. They countered well, with speed and pace, and it made it really difficult for us on the night. But we won when we weren’t particularly playing well, which I think is a sign of a good team. And yeah, the clean sheet...I mean, it's something that I've wanted since the start of the season, it’s something that I set as a goal at the beginning of the season. So, yeah, I'm really happy to achieve that.”

On what it means to be the league’s record holder

“It's a great feeling to have it just be me, like it's not a tied record, it's Orlando Pride. It's me out in front. So yeah, that's a great feeling. It's something, like I said before, I wanted it. It was one of my goals before the season, to kind of see if I could get that record. It probably only became more of a reality as the season went on. I'm like, ‘Yeah, I can actually do this.’ And now we have, I think it's five games left to go, so I just want to extend that record as much as I can and hopefully it stays for many years.”

On how much the defense in front of her has helped

“I mean, the defensive work rate from the whole team has been massive. It's been incredible to see week in, week out. The consistency with that defensive effort and the defensive mindset that we have is something that I've never had in a team before. So it's really good to see that. Em [Sams] and Kylie [Strom] have just been solid in front of me, the two center backs. So massive shout out to them. The fullbacks, massive shout out to them. I mean, I really couldn't do it without any single person on this team and I know it's my name that gets put with that record, but honestly, it should be Orlando Pride because I literally could not do it without them. And yes, I've had to make some saves, but for the majority of the time, they're literally doing all the work. And yeah, I can only thank them for that.”