England Under-19 star Gilly Flaherty opened the scoring for Arsenal Ladies in a comprehensive 3-0 victory at Sparta Prague to put them a step closer to the quarterfinals of the Woman’s Champions League.
Tony Gervaise’s side now have a straightforward task at Wednesday’s home leg at Borehamwood FC after this solid display in their Round of 16 tie.
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Defender Flaherty scored her first of the season on 11 minutes and Republic of Ireland defender Ciara Grant headed home Rachel Yankey’s corner to make it 2-0 16 minutes later.
Yankey, Jayne Ludlow and Helen Lander all had opportunities to extend the lead in the first half, before Kim Little’s penalty sealed the victory.
Further chances went begging and Arsenal were almost made to pay in the closing stages when the Czechs missed a few gilt-edge opportunities of their own.
There was to be no grand-stand finish, however, and Gervaise said, “Prague are a decent team who can suck you in then hit you on the break, so we’ll be taking nothing for granted in the second leg.
“But if we can play as we did today and be that bit sharper in front of goal, we should be good enough to go through.
“We controlled the game throughout and played really well in spells.
“The only negative was not scoring more but we kept a clean sheet and that’s vital with the second leg in mind.”
Nick Grounds, Sportsister
The Women’s Sports Magazine
