Orlando Pride Head Coach Seb Hines
On the result
“Frustrating. Obviously, we don't like losing, and we don't like conceding four goals, especially at home. Really disappointed with the result. There were some good moments, but it wasn't enough tonight.”
On conceding early goals
“It can happen so quickly. You go in promising positions where I think we started in the first one or two minutes. Then you get punished for not ending it, not finishing your press, or one ball switched off at the back, and it allows Washington, who is really dangerous in transition, with acres of space to run into. I am not happy with the last two games and the amount of goals that we have conceded. We have to stop the bleeding now and that cannot happen.
On second half approach and substitutions
“I mean Marta wasn’t fit, we knew that going into it. But I think she brings leadership, she brings that aura around the group and it gives them confidence, so we thought it was beneficial to have her in and around the team, so she wasn't an option to come off the bench. After we got back into it, going into halftime 2-2, we felt that we had a lot of good momentum ending the half. Again, we have to ensure that we have to be switched on in the back and not allow any opportunities for the opponent. You’re probably most vulnerable when you feel like you’re in a position that you are going to score, and that's kind of what happened. Just looking back at the last goal, we go from a position where we kind of knick it and then there's a long ball that we don't challenge, it bounces. We step when we should drop, and they got behind again. So there's a lot to analyze and a lot to review, and we have got to learn from these moments.”
Orlando Pride Defender Nicole Payne
On the result
“I think it’s definitely a difficult one. Obviously, nobody likes to lose at home. We’ve been working really hard. Especially after the last game, we really went to work to try and work on the things that we needed to fix and tweak. We fell a little bit short. But obviously, we’re a very, very good team, and we’ll have more moments. We know that we can do better and clean up those things that we need to. But yeah, we’ll for sure be better.”
On road back from injury
“It’s been very difficult and very long journey it's been almost 15 months now, so it’s been a while and just have a lot of gratitude for the staff, for Seb [Hines], for the medical staff here in Orlando. I feel very lucky and very blessed to be here. I feel like I’ve put in a lot of work to be here with my teammates as well, and my teammates have been my biggest supporters and I’m just very lucky, very blessed to be here and to have a support staff like this is incredible especially coming off an injury like that, and it’s very common in the league but just to have people support you like this is unreal so I owe it to them.”
On mentality throughout the match
“I think going down two goals is difficult, but we did what we needed to do to get back into the game. And in the locker room again, we’re always trying to tweak things, see how we can be better and come back out to win the game. We always want to win, we know that we can win, we know that we can be one of the best teams in the league, and we are one of the best teams in the league. We just have to really hone in on what we can do and just put games to bed, really.”
