Every word of Renée’s pre-Leicester presser | Press conference | News

Renée Slegers was back in front of the media for her pre-Leicester City press conference at the Sobha Realty Training Centre on Tuesday.

She was asked to provide the latest team news, share her thoughts on Wednesday’s match and more.

Here’s everything she had to say on the following subjects…

on team news:
No changes from the squad we had last weekend.

on Chloe Kelly:
Chloe Kelly won’t be available tomorrow. She’s progressing, she’s making steps, but too early tomorrow.

on if she will rotate:
I think that’s why we built the squad and full trust in the squad that when these short turnarounds, when they come, everybody’s ready, and I think we’ve had a lot of players involved lately, whether that’s the start or finish, and that’s one of our big strengths in the squad, and that’s the way we want to work. So we’ll have players ready for tomorrow. We’re in the here and now, it’s about tomorrow, we have a very important game against Leicester, so that’s what we’re focused on.

on facing Leicester:
We are always strong, and that’s, again, the strength of our squad, the power of our togetherness, the different qualities and the different tools that we have in the squad. So we have to start well, we have to finish well, and we have to look at what Leicester is going to do. I think it’s a midweek game for them as well. They don’t do much of this, so let’s see how they manage, we won’t know until tomorrow. So we plan for scenarios, and again, I think that’s been a super strength of ours, how we start and finish games.

on Steph Catley’s move to centre-back:
I think you have to stay open-minded. I think you have to see what’s happening in front of you. I remember the moment well, it was West Ham away and Steph stepped in as centre-back for the first time. She did so well and she never left. I think she played maybe some minutes in the full-back position since then. She’s been there and she’s been so good. I think that’s who Steph is. She’s so consistent, you know what you can expect from Steph. I think she’s intelligent, so she can play different roles on the pitch. Even if you start in a certain position, what’s asked of you in that position, she’s done that really well. We’re really happy and delighted that Steph chose to continue her Arsenal journey with us.

on both men’s and women’s teams in Champions League semi-finals:
I think Arsenal as a club should be very proud. For both teams going very far in the competitions and being on the European stage. I think it’s not just achieved today, but it’s achieved through time. That’s why I’m proud to be part of the club as well. I think there’s great things being done. It’s really inspiring to watch the men’s team play. Of course, we won’t be able to watch the game tomorrow, but might watch it back. We share facilities, so we saw some of them yesterday. It’s inspiring to see how well we’re doing.

on Manchester City dropping points:
Of course, we follow the league because it’s our context. We look at what’s happening around us. At the same time, we’re so focused on ourselves. We know we have three games in hand. They’re all difficult, challenging games. We have to look at what we can do. As long as it’s theoretically possible, we’ll push everything we can. Again, that starts with us and what we can do. That starts tomorrow.

on Leicester fighting for their lives and the impact of dropping out of WSL:
I think they’re fighting for their lives. We’ll see that mentality on the pitch tomorrow. We’ll have to be prepared for that. We know how they want to play their football. They’ll add a couple of percentages if that’s the context and the situation. We’ll have to be at our very best tomorrow. They’ll be fighting. There are, of course, play-offs between WSL and WSL2 at the end of the season. That’s their context. Every team is hoping and fighting to compete at the very highest level. That’s their context. Our context is that we’re in a spot and we want to keep putting pressure on. We want to do what we can do and get our points, as many points as possible, in these last five games remaining.

on Brighton’s plans for a new purpose-built stadium for the women’s team:
This is news to me. I’ve just come out of a team meeting! I think what’s most important is that every club in their situation looks at what’s best for us to help the football grow, help society grow, even help the men’s and the women’s team grow. I’m very happy that I’m part of Arsenal because I think they’ve done that so well for so long. We’re very proud to play at the Emirates. Every weekend, all the WSL games. This was our last one in the Champions League for this year. It was a fantastic atmosphere last weekend. I think I mentioned it after the game, but I think after the penalty, the disallowed penalty, there was such a synergy between us and the fans. I’m just really grateful to be part of Arsenal. Like I said, every club needs to look at it from their own perspective and see what’s best to move things forward. That looks different. I don’t think there’s one blueprint that works for everyone. It looks different for everyone.

on rumours surrounding the futures of Mead and McCabe:
Of course, my biggest respect for those players. They’ve been at Arsenal for so long. They’ve contributed to the growth of the team, the performances, the results of the team, everything that’s been pushed in the club, bigger picture, women’s football. My biggest respect is going to those players. I love working with them. They’re both top professionals, very intelligent players. They bring a lot to the group, a lot of energy and leadership in their own ways, with their own personality. I love working with them. I’m fully focused on the here and now and trying to achieve as much as possible with those players. In the squad, unfortunately, Beth is not with us because of personal reasons at the moment. But they mean so much to the team. They mean so much to me as well. I just want to focus on the here and now and what we can achieve together.

on the squad’s problem-solving ability:
It’s so good. I think you’re constantly learning yourself as well. Where it’s at at the moment, it’s new to me because as a player myself or in the environments I’ve been in as a coach, it’s never been like this. Of course, you take inspiration from others and from other environments, but the way it is here at the moment, it’s something I didn’t even know was possible. It’s not necessarily something we have been working towards and this is it, this is how it needs to be. We have been taking steps consistently and we had a vision and we had a belief. Where that takes you, you don’t exactly know how that looks, but the way it looks, for me, it’s very inspiring because I think the collaboration between staff and players, for me, it’s such a great environment to work in and I think that’s one of our super strengths if you see it, how players then find solutions on the pitch, the belief and confidence they can take from knowing that we have a diversity of tools, diversity of qualities. We have so many things that we can pull from and doing that in the right moment. I think that’s what we have been saying, that will be our next step and if you look at that in the Lyon game, there are some really critical, crucial moments where we do the right things and that’s a big part of player ownership and then reading it and communicating it and changing things and it’s so good. I love working with this team and we want to take it even further, but at the moment, that’s a big part of the strength in the group that we have.