Hayley Raso netted on her competitive debut for the Club as we cruised to a 4-0 victory over newcomers Crystal Palace in the opening game of our Barclays Women’s Super League campaign on Sunday afternoon.
Raso, making her first outing at Brisbane Road after signing in the summer, fired home a low left-footed effort into the bottom corner to get us off to a perfect start and, despite a quiet first half of opportunities, we added a further three goals after the break.
Jess Naz doubled our advantage before Drew Spence, who provided the assist for our second goal, fired home our third of the afternoon. The scoring was rounded off in spectacular fashion as Olga Ahtinen’s stunning strike from distance found the top corner.
There was late drama as the visitors ended the game with 10 players after Brooke Aspin was shown two yellow cards in quick succession deep into injury-time.
Robert Vilahamn's first starting XI of the new campaign featured three of our summer signings with Clare Hunt and Maite Oroz making their competitive debuts alongside Raso, while Katelin Talbert and Anna Csiki were named among the substitutes. Former Spurs player and captain Josie Green started for Palace after signing for Laura Kaminski’s side in the summer.
Similar to our fixtures during the pre-season programme, we made a positive start in the opening stages of the game and, after a lengthy stoppage as Amanda Nilden received treatment after a clash to her head, Raso carved out our first opportunity as she tested Shae Yanez with an effort from the edge of the box.
The Australia international was causing a number of problems down the right-hand side and, on 19 minutes, she opened the deadlock as a long ball from Eveliina Summanen set the forward through down the right who did well to advance into the box before firing a low left-footed effort into the bottom corner.
Chances were few and far between following our opening goal, with only notable opportunities from Martha Thomas, who sent a powerful effort into the hands of Yanez, and Raso, who was denied her second goal of the game from close-range by the Palace goalkeeper.
We were inches away from doubling our lead within a minute of the restart, Ashleigh Neville seeing her header from Nilden’s corner cleared off the line but, seven minutes later, Naz eventually added a second, advancing through on goal with just Yaez to beat and finished on the rebound after her initial shot was saved.
Raso remained a lively outlet on the right as we reached midway through the second half as she drifted inside before her effort towards goal took a massive deflection and just narrowly went wide of the post, while Bethany England and Oroz were both denied in quick succession by Yaez.
The visitors continued to pose a threat on the break and Annabel Blanchard might feel she could have done better on 74 minutes, dragging a left-footed shot across the face of the goal, but just two minutes later we further extended our advantage when Spence fired a low-drilled effort into bottom left corner following some excellent build-up play from England.
And with two minutes left on the clock, it was 4-0. Ahtinen picked up the ball from around 25 yards out and sent a stunning strike into the top left corner – certainly a Goal of the Season contender after just one WSL fixture. The WSL debutants were reduced to 10 players after Aspin picked up two yellow cards in quick succession in the closing stages as we recorded our biggest league win under Vilahamn.
