Shelley Kerr’s plan to pick off England leaves Erin Cuthbert isolated
A goal down fewer than 15 minutes in thanks to Nikita Parris’s clinically taken spot-kick, the lower-ranked British nation needed to dig deep but their tanks already appeared spent. It was the biggest match of their careers but the 11 on the pitch looked out of their depth and lost.
The buzz coming into the game had been intense, the players of course refusing to admit that who their opposition was mattered. Their first World Cup match was their own, not England’s, and the narrative grew old. But there in Nice, in the scorching late afternoon sun with the humidity bordering on the unbearable, it could have been Utrecht in 2017, when England won 6-0 against Scotland. The Scots had scrambled in defence and when the Lionesses pushed against those in blue they wilted.
The formation left the team buried in their own half with Erin Cuthbert surrendered as a lone centre-forward, abandoned in attack with a sea of green grass separating her from her compatriots. It was not because it was England, it was because it was the thirdranked nation in the world and Shelley Kerr had opted for defensive banks, figuratively parking the bus. Yet it failed to work, the windscreen smashed by Parris’s penalty, the high intensity and relentless press from the Lionesses enough to take the wheels off the bus.
It was not going to be another 6-0. The team under Kerr are far too good for that. But at the Allianz Riviera the memories of Scotland’s debut in the Euros came flooding back. In Scotland Women’s 47-year history they had faced their southern neighbours 25 times before the World Cup, the Lionesses with 22 wins to their name, Scotland with just two, and here England looked certain to extend their advantage.
Banked up but confusingly slack when it came to actual man-marking, blue would get only so close to white before standing off and letting their bigger sisters muscle their way through. The Tartan Army remained in full voice throughout, urging their players on, but it was for nought, England’s second a near hammer-blow for Scotland just before half-time.
If Kerr demanded change, there was none to be seen on the pitch initially in the second half. The shoulders started to droop, the balmy evening stretching on ahead of the debutants. The heat began to tell and as Scotland slacked off even more, England began to ease a boot off of the gas.
The relaxed tempo of the second half gave Scotland a chance, Kerr’s substitutions combined with a desperately needed change of shape opened the game up. Kirsty Smith and Chloe Arthur’s fresh legs benefited the team but the opportunity to play Arsenal’s Lisa Evans higher up was the clincher for Scotland. From the brink of humiliation, Scotland pulled themselves back with Evans the instigator.
A mistake from Steph Houghton was all the encouragement the Gunner needed to open up the chance and set Claire Emslie up. She gave Scotland a lifeline and put her name down in the history books as the first female Scotland player to score at a World Cup. And the first senior Scotland player to score at the showpiece tournament since Craig Burley in 1998.
The goal caused a ripple of noise at the stadium, the Tartan Army drowning out the Lionesses’ fans, but with 11 minutes left on the clock and Scotland already spent, their final charge was a laborious one. The humidity had lessened over the course of the match but, forced to chase and pick themselves up time and again over the 90 minutes, the Scottish legs were heavy, flesh sunkissed and burnt.
Time fast ran out for Scotland in Nice, their first ever World Cup match one that would go down as a defeat but from 0-2 and nowhere Kerr’s team had dug out a 1-2, the goal not just a galvanising one but one that could yet change the final standings of the group. With the top four third-placed teams advancing to the knockouts, Scotland slashed their goal deficit in half in one swift move.
Given the nature of the team who could be vying for one of those four berths, Scotland had once again done what they can to take their destiny into their own hands, a goal at the World Cup – any goal at the World Cup – a positive to build on.
The match was a lesson for all in the Scotland camp, the excessive defence and lack of creativity something that will be remedied before they travel north to Rennes to face Japan, and then a last group game against Argentina.