Everton will look to "bounce back" from their "dissapointing" defeat against Manchester United when they take on Tottenham in the Women's Super League at the weekend.
The Blues have enjoyed a bright start to the season and currently sit sixth in the table after picking up three wins from their opening six games. However, Brian Sorensen's side were dealt a blow on Sunday as league leaders Manchester United scored three without reply at Walton Hall Park.
Sorensen described the contest as a "wake up call" for his team, but midfielder Izzy Christiansen told the ECHO the group are determined not to let heads drop ahead of the weekend's trip to Spurs.
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“I think we’ve done really well in some games," Christiansen said. "We were really disappointed with that result against Man United but on the whole things have been really positive, especially compared to last season when we had a lot of instability.
"I think now we’ve got a platform to perform and we’re really getting stuck into how Brian and his team want us to play and we’re really trying to show what we can do.”
She added: "After the game and in training this week we’ve been trying to make sure we don’t let our heads drop. I popped a message in the players’ group chat on Sunday night because I got home and felt rubbish, and I just said 'lets make sure we don’t let one bad result define us and lets keep looking ahead so we don’t feel the same next weekend'.
"It is an important week for us. We’ve got to bounce back.”
The 31-year-old made her senior debut for Everton in 2008 and had a spell at Birmingham City before making the switch to Manchester City in 2014. Her eye-catching performances for City saw her seal a move to European giants Lyon, where she won a treble comprising a league title, the Coupe de France and UEFA Women's Champions League.
The midfielder returned to Merseyside in 2020 and believes the Blues are now on an upward trajectory after last season's dismal WSL campaign saw Everton finish tenth and fail to pick up a win in their last seven games.
“When I first came back here, I came back for the project that was sold to me which was a team that was on the rise," Christiansen said.
"That graph looked slightly different last year but I feel like we’re back on the right lines now to getting back to where we want to be. T he last three home games we’ve been sold out.
"For me, that’s massive progress and there’s a really good atmosphere now building at Walton Hall Park. If you’d have asked me last season did I see that at realistic I’d have said no but now its just like wow. To see so many Evertonians come out and support us and building up a supporters group and singing from start to end of the game, that’s progress as well."
Everton will travel to Brisbane Road on Sunday where they'll come up against a Tottenham side buoyed by a staggering 8-0 victory over Brighton. The two sides are level on points going into the game, with Tottenham sitting above Everton on goal difference.
Reflecting on the quality of the opposition, Christiansen said: "I think they’ve done really well under Rehanne Skinner and there’s a togetherness there. They beat us in pre-season but we used a lot of youth players so I don’t think that was a fair reflection of where we’re both at.
"We expect a very tough challenge and obviously off the back of an 8-0 win, everyone’s going to be flying high after that so we need to make sure we’re ready to put our game plan in place and stifle them.”
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