Dan McNamara praised his “excellent” Wolves Women team after derby day delight at Molineux.
Wolves beat West Brom Women 5-0 on Sunday afternoon to move to within two points of Nottingham Forest in top spot. Tammi George, Amber Hughes, Becky Anderson, Destiney Toussaint and Charlotte Greengrass were all on the scoresheet, as McNamara’s side were dominant in their victory. McNamara touched on the performance, goalscoring prowess, the final three games, and the Wolves Foundation.
On the performance
“I thought we were excellent. At half-time I wanted more from them and a few of them went out with a point to prove, not because I thought we were poor, but with a bit more quality, you could see the result coming, like what we've just witnessed.
“We worked hard this week on how we can exploit them because they can be dangerous, like we saw in the semi-final, so we made sure we nullified what they wanted to do which was get the ball in behind our back line, then to hurt them in the half spaces which we knew they find difficult to defend.
“I’m pleased with the girls and the performance they put in today, but also how hard they have worked in the last couple of weeks. These hard times when you have a week without a game, it's easy to lose focus, but also how they apply themselves for the back end of the season.
“It’s unfortunate that we’re not in anything or fighting for anything, though we’re fighting to keep the pressure on Forest obviously, but it was superb from them all today and I thought there were some real standouts.”
On variety of goalscorers
“I think it's been a feature of the whole season, we've had goals galore from everywhere on the pitch. Amber has scored 18 league goals now this season which is phenomenal, and I think it's 15 or 16 for Charlotte as well, they're both up there fighting for the golden boot.
“I keep saying that in a normal season where there isn't a Newcastle or a Forest in it, we’d be doing really well, and fighting to win this league, but it's the fine margins and why we find ourselves in the situation we are in.
“We have to keep putting in performances like that. Anything can happen in football so we’ll keep going out on the pitch and executing game plans and we'll do well.
“Talk about standout performances, Tammi George was phenomenal, probably the best performance of the season. She looked like she had something to prove, definitely a deserved player of the match and hopefully we see more of that over the next three or four weeks.”
On looking ahead to final three games
“We can't do anything now, we're now 19 games in and lost once all season, it's a phenomenal record and the fact we are not going to win the league this year is credit to Forest and what they've done.
“But on the back hand of that is credit to Wolves and the way we as staff, players, fans, the backroom team, have managed to do what we have this year, we have to take huge credit and keep enjoying the ride.
“I said to the girls there at the end, these memories, we don't know when they will stop so you have to keep enjoying and embracing them and we’ll see how we get on in the final three games.”
On the foundation and Wolverhampton 10k run
“I don't think I’ve got long left in my legs, I can feel them going, the camera is probably catching me sinking down slowly!
“But what an unbelievable part of the club the foundation is, and rewind seven years ago when we didn't have all this, they were a massive part of what I was doing, Laura Nicholls who has moved on now, and Tom Warren and Steve Cullis all working up in the office supporting me.
“To be able to give back to that part of the club is amazing. I kept up with Nathan up until the 3k marker then he had to show his muscles. It was fantastic, I really enjoyed it and congratulations to all the people who completed it.”
