Women’s Super League: talking points from the weekend’s action

Manchester United’s manager, Marc Skinner, raged over two penalty appeals waved away by the referee, Cheryl Foster, in their 1-0 defeat at the WSL champions, Chelsea. “They’re stonewall when I watch them both,” he said. “We have to invest in the officials, we have to invest in the surrounding technology that can help. We’ve come to the champions’ home ground and put our stamp on it – you need those things to go for you.” Skinner also pointed to other incidents this season and warned of the impact of poor decisions on the destination of the title. “It’s the same as what happened in the Arsenal game [against Chelsea in the Continental Cup final], where [Caitlin] Foord goes into the box and Kadeisha [Buchanan] brings her down – it’s a penalty. They need to be picked up, they’re obvious. If they are not obvious we would swallow the medicine and get on with it. We have learned about our resolve and resilience this season; we didn’t crumble. We shouldn’t have to address it, not in big games when we go on to this stage and these are big for what the league looks like in the next eight games. That’s huge decisions.” SW

Jonas Eidevall reserved praise for the midfield performance of Leah Williamson after Arsenal’s 4-0 defeat of Reading. It was “definitely her best match I have seen her play in midfield”, he said after Arsenal finished an eight-day stretch with three wins, nine goals, one conceded and a League Cup trophy. “Sometimes I feel like you don’t get her facing forward enough in midfield. We got her facing forward, but in more advanced positions. How today played out was probably the optimum scenario for having Leah as a central midfielder because you get one of the best passers in the world but you get it 15 metres higher