TESSEL MIDDAG has warned her Rangers teammates that they will have to find a clinical edge if they are to come out on top of the three-way fight at the top of the SWPL.
Midfielder Middag hit the crossbar with a free-kick and her Rangers teammates spurned numerous opportunities to break the deadlock in Saturday’s goalless draw against Celtic at Broadwood, allowing Glasgow City to go top of the league with a 4-1 win over Partick Thistle yesterday.
That followed the frustration of being held to a 1-1 draw by Glasgow City the week before, when Rangers again failed to convert opportunities to take all three points, and Middag says that they have to be more ruthless if they are to emerge as champions.
“I think that was the case last season as well [that it was so tight at the top of the table],” Middag said.
“And you could see when we played Glasgow City last week as well and drew 1-1, there are fine margins.
“We will have to be on the top of our game every single week, probably goal difference might be a factor to look at too, but especially in those direct games against Celtic and Glasgow City we need to win some of those games.
“Last week that was definitely my verdict coming away from it. I felt that last week we were a bit more dominant than even we were against Celtic, we imposed our will even more on them last week and created a lot of chances, especially in the last 20 minutes.
“So, I would definitely say that our quality, our decision making in the final third was crucial last week, but I felt like this week we almost struggled a bit to find a tactical answer almost to the way they played.
“Coming away from this match I would say, how can we break their lines or break through them in different ways? So, there were different takeaways from both games, I would say.
“In the end, yes, it comes down to being more clinical in front of goal. I had a free-kick off the crossbar, another header from Hannah Davidson that could have gone in, so in the end we only need one chance to go in and it’s a different game and a different story. So, yeah, it’s all about being clinical as well.
“I was saying to some of the girls on the bench in the final few minutes [against Celtic], whatever happens we had to keep a clean sheet and at least come away with the draw knowing what it means to play against Celtic.”
There was a crowd of 3228 at Broadwood to take in the Old Firm clash, with a school of thought that the game may have been switched to Ibrox, given the fact the men’s team are on hiatus during the World Cup.
But Middag says that the Rangers players are starting to feel at home in Cumbernauld, and she hopes that more of those fans who came along on Saturday will come back on a regular basis.
“It’s always an honour to play at Ibrox, but I just heard we had more fans at Broadwood than we did for when we played Benfica in the Champions League at Ibrox,” she said.
“In the end, it’s about raising our fanbase as much as possible, and sometimes when you play in a big stadium and only have three, four or five thousand people it feels less than when you are playing in a smaller stadium.
“So, I actually didn’t mind us playing at Broadwood, and it’s starting to feel more and more like our home ground.
“Hopefully we can attract as many fans to the rest of the games this season, though of course I would love to play another game at Ibrox.
“You are right in saying that we maybe hoped to profit from the fact the men’s game is off for a couple of weeks.
“We try to make people aware that Rangers has a professional women’s team that actually competes for a lot of trophies.
“Hopefully more and more fans will realise it’s not just men’s team, there is a women’s team as well that play some good football. That’s what we try to do anyway, and we can compete for the top spots.”
Meanwhile, Celtic attacker Clarissa Larisey was satisfied enough with the point her side gained, having come with a gameplan to frustrate Rangers and hit them on the break.
“I think, one hundred percent, we need to see it is a positive result,” Larisey said.
“We have a lot of respect for Rangers, we know they are a good team and we knew this would be a challenging fixture. “We were strong as a team and I thought we dealt with them fairly well over the 90 minutes. “The challenge now is for us to be as consistent as possible and try to build on this.”
