Renée on Palace, Emirates Stadium and defending

Renée Slegers feels the Women’s Super League is stronger than ever, with the newly promoted teams already looking competitive.

We take on Crystal Palace in our first home match of the Campaign at Emirates Stadium on Sunday, after the Eagles got off to a winning start with a 1-0 win over Everton last weekend.

Newly-promoted Birmingham City also made life difficult for last season’s champions Manchester City, who couldn’t find the breakthrough until the second half.

“I think it’s growing and I think everything is developing, so automatically the games will be better, tougher, more competitive,” our head coach said in Friday’s pre-match press conference. “I think it’s really early in the season still, just one round played, so let’s see over time how things develop.

“But definitely, I think Crystal Palace v Everton was a competitive game and the same with Birmingham, creating issues especially in the first half against [Manchester] City. That’s good, and hopefully we can keep the standard so competition is high in the league.”

Our N5 return will be a welcome one, given that we’ve made our home stadium a fortress in the WSL.

We are unbeaten in each of our last 19 home games in the division (W16 D3), already a club record; overall, we are 18 games unbeaten (W14 D4) and only once have had a longer run, going 19 undefeated between August 2011 and October 2012.

So is it the toughest place for a visiting manager to come?

“You'd have to ask the opposition manager,” Renée replied. “I don't know. I haven't been in that position. But yes, we know what we want to create for ourselves there, and that's us on that pitch, in that setting, together with the fans and bring the fans with us, and that's always a really lovely and nice atmosphere that we create, like all the moments that we've had there so far with the supporters.

“So I really look forward to creating that again on Sunday. So I can only speak for myself and what we can create for ourselves and how that fuels us and our performances.”

We’ve also had an incredibly stubborn defence of late. In 2026, we have kept nine WSL clean sheets in 12 games – four more than any other team.

Of teams to play more than one game in a year in the WSL, only Chelsea in 2017 (10 clean sheets in 13 games, 77%) have a better clean sheet ratio in a year than us this year (75%). We’ve faced just 1.5 shots on target per game (18 in 12 games), the lowest ratio by a team in a calendar year in WSL history. So what makes us so difficult to score against?

“I think quality in the squad, but also the discipline and responsibility that players take on the pitch,” Renée said. “And we work a lot on the defending side of our game. I think the way we plan for games as well with the coaches, Aaron [D’Antino], Mel [Phillips], in the background, doing a lot of work to make sure that we come out the right way.

“And that's, I think, the combination of all these things, the coaches in the background, the players on the pitch, how they take responsibility and how they execute the quality that we have. And we take pride in defending. So it's been a big part of us last season and will continue to be this season.”