England boss Sarina Wiegman has called on her attackers to be more ruthless after the Lionesses kicked off their World Cup campaign with a limp 1-0 win over Haiti.
Georgia Stanway scored the only goal of the game, with the midfielder firing home a penalty midway through the first-half.
Other than that, England could not find the back of the net and they squandered a few good opportunities.
The Lionesses have been struggling in front of goal even before this tournament and they have not scored from open play since April. And asked why England are struggling, Wiegman said: “Ruthlessness.
“What does that mean? Sometimes the connections with the cross, the timing of the cross, where the cross ends in the penalty box and little things like that.
“We were very close to scoring a goal, but their defence was tough too. We keep trying and working on it and start again tomorrow.”
Haiti will consider themselves unlucky to come away from this Group D opener with nothing. England goalkeeper Mary Earps had to make two big saves in the second half to keep the Lionesses ahead.
England understandably looked rusty given the lack of football leading into this tournament and Wiegman will hope they find rhythm with more minutes.
“We were slow to start, but on the other hand we could’ve scored early in the game,” she said. “What we said at half-time was we wanted to speed up the game, to play with a higher speed of the ball.
“There were opportunities to play through the first press on the side, and to play into [Alessia] Russo.
“We got some rhythm in the second half and you could feel the second goal was coming, but then they had a dangerous counter attack and took us out of our rhythm.”
