Manchester City’s hopes of qualifying for the Women’s Champions League received a major boost as they won 2-0 at West Ham.
Georgia Stanway opened the scoring for Gareth Taylor’s side by finding the bottom corner of the net with eight minutes gone.
Seventh-placed West Ham, though, can be testing opponents under their the New Zealand coach, Olli Harder, – they beat City in the reverse fixture – and they dug in, albeit benefiting from some City wastefulness and a fine display from the home goalkeeper, Mackenzie Arnold.
West Ham briefly threatened, with Claudia Walker heading over and then denying her own team a golden opportunity by touching the ball when offside instead of leaving it to teammate Adriana Leon to run through on goal.
City were never sure of the victory until the second goal arrived on the hour mark when Khadija Shaw made it 2-0 with a clinical header.
City’s win, their seventh consecutive victory in all competitions, put them level on points with third-placed Manchester United. The top three qualify for next season’s Champions League and four WSL games remain.
The two sides face each other again in the FA Women’s Cup semi-final on 16 April.
THE FOOTBALL HUB 