Manchester City 5-0 Aston Villa: WSL side’s storming second half

Five second-half goals saw Manchester City bounce back from last week’s 4-0 loss to Chelsea to triumph 5-0 against Aston Villa.

Villa dug deep and defended well in the first half, making use of their back five to shut out any of City’s attacks before mistakes in the second half saw the home side runaway with the game, as substitute Hayley Raso shined.

As well as the spirited defensive performance in the first half, Hannah Hampton made a good account of herself in the opening period, pushing Ellen White’s almost-certain tap-in wide of the post.

But the Blues’ fortunes would soon change, and City came quick out the blocks after the break, Caroline Weir running through the Villa defence, leaving Elisha N’Dow on the floor before the Scottish midfielder curled the ball into the goal.

Matters got worse for the away side three minutes later when Georgia Stanway took advantage of a goalmouth scramble to hook the ball out of the reach of an onlooking Hampton.

City were on the front foot from that point onwards and the visitors’ defence started to falter, Hampton’s clearance of a Vicky Losada shot finding Raso who fired home her first goal for Manchester City.

The Australian then turned provider, running through the defence before squaring it to Hemp to extend their tally to four,

Raso then netted once more when she took advantage of a loose ball in front of goal to coolly tap in the game’s fifth and final goal.

Gareth Taylor, Manchester City manager, said: “A lot of people – me included – have come in for a lot of slack. We’ve got to rally around and support each other.

“There are exceptional circumstances and we know that we need to do better in a lot of areas but I think Karima has been thrust into a situation.

“We didn’t have a substitute keeper on the bench today so we were readying Georgia [Stanway] for that moment if needed. Thankfully we didn’t have to get to it.

“We’ve got faith in Karima. There was a lot of support from within here at the club to just try and help her as best as we can.“For her to turn about today and come under a few hairy moments in terms of our build-up play and still play effectively I thought was great for her. To get the clean sheet for all of the team was ideal.”

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