Scotland’s World Cup adventure started with a controversial and narrow defeat to England last night.
England took the lead after 15 minutes when the VAR spotted a Nicola Docherty handball in the penalty area and advised referee Jana Adamkovato award a penalty.
Nikita Parris fired the resultant spot-kick past Lee Alexander then Ellen White doubled England’s advantage in the 31st minute.
The Scots continued to push forward and Claire Emslie pulled one back in the dying stages but Phil Neville’s side held on to secure the victory.
After the game manager Shelley Kerr said: “In the first instance I think it was harsh but obviously there are rules in place but that is what VAR is there to do, help them.
“By the letter of the law it is a penalty but I still thought it was harsh.
“After England scored they were on the ascendancy and they created a few chances and were really dominant after the first ten minutes.
“If it had been the sole decision and finished 1-0 I might feel a bit worse but I didn’t think we played well – you’ve got to try to adapt your game plan after those decisions and we did lose a bit of momentum.
“The rules are the rules and we can’t change that.
“We need to look at the first half and where things went wrong – we are playing at a World Cup so we need to scrutinise that – we weren’t at our best,
“The second half I think we performed really well but we need to recover now because that was a tough game and we are going to face a though Japanese team.
“There was lots of positives in terms of our attacking play in the second half and you have to bear in mind that you can’t always attack when you are playing teams that are higher ranked than you.
“You need to have a bit of patience and be structured and organised and it will be a different type of game against Japan but lots of positives to take.”
The Scots now need positive results in their remaining Group D fixtures against Japan and Argentina to see them through to the knockout stages.
John graduated from Telford College in 2010 with an HNC in Practical Journalism and since then he worked for the North Edinburgh News, The Southern Reporter, the Irish News Review and The Edinburgh Reporter. In addition he has been published in the Edinburgh Evening News and the Hibernian FC Programme.
