Arsenal Women boss Jonas Eidevall says the maturity of his team will be key when they face Leicester City this weekend, as the opponents begin life under new manager Willie Kirk in the Women's Super League.
The Foxes parted ways with manager Lydia Bedford on Thursday, just days before the Gunners' trip to the King Power. She's been replaced by the club's director of football and former Everton boss, Kirk.
Eidevall admitted on Friday they had prepared to face a Leicester City side under Bedford, but says he trusts his side and the maturity they've built to handle whatever team or formation they face on Sunday.
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"It’s a difficult one because my answer is probably changing," the Arsenal boss said. "I had another idea yesterday when we prepared and we could have the history of them playing under Lydia Bedford.
"They’ve changed their coach, so now we have a game that is very much in the unknown. Even more so than any other game.
"What I have seen from Leicester before is a very organised and structured team. Very hard working. When we look at the underlying numbers, it’s one of the best defensive teams in the whole league.
"We have seen that in their recent games against Manchester United and then Reading. It’s a very hard team to break down. We have to be very good on the ball to create enough goalscoring opportunities to win the game."
Eidevall added maturity is one of the most underrated elements of the game and says it's something his team are continuously striving towards.
"For us, what we’re trying to build, and one of the most underrated things, is the concept of team maturity," he continued.
"Team maturity is how many different situations can you deal with as a team. You need to have time together to build that experience, but you also of course have to be effective with the time.
"We’re building that all the time. All the experiences that we have, either in games or what we try to create in training, it goes towards games like this. We can’t say what we are going to expect (against Leicester), so we have to trust the maturity here to handle the formations we can deal with.
"Hopefully, that’s enough (to win) but we need to be good at it."
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