Amanda Ilestedt scores her first goal for AWFC
Arsenal Women walked away 2-1 winners against Southampton on Thursday night, in a game that was pretty even throughout the match, it came down to the last minutes for Arsenal to snatch the three points and we have Amanda Ilestedt and her magnificent leap to thank for it.
Ilestedt joined Arsenal Women in July this year from French side PSG where she has spent two year’s in the French capital. Since joining Arsenal she looks to be the real deal. Arsenal fans were sitting and waiting to watch her at the Women’s World Cup to see what we were in for and were not disappointed. Ilestedt played some incredible football for her country, Sweden, throughout the World Cup and looked to be one of their best players.
Helping Sweden reach the semi finals of the Women’s World Cup against the winners Spain, where they lost 2-1, were knocked out of the tournament after an extremely impressive campaign. Ilestedt scoring 4 goals herself throughout the tournament and scored some incredible goals for her country – Ilestedt was also awarded the Bronze Boot.
Since joining Arsenal she has looked dangerous and seems to have settled in perfectly and has helped us look a lot more solid at the back this season, pairing up well with Lotte Wubben-Moy and she also has the ability to bring the ball forward to attack. Scoring her first goal for the club on Thursday night after a trademark jump in the box reached the head of Ilestedt who headed the ball into the back of the net and won the game for her team.
When asked how she felt about scoring her first goal for Arsenal Women in a post match interview and said this “Yeah finally! I’ve been waiting for this moment, so yeah, obviously I’m really happy to score and to help the team win” and looked delighted with scoring the winning goal. However, Amanda was also very down-to-earth about Arsenal‘s usual standards not being met the game and the need for improvement..
“We have a lot to improve in how we played today, We didn’t really come up to our standards, but the most important thing is that we got the three points. I’m happy with the points, but I think we can improve a lot.”
Arsenal Women fans will be hoping we see a lot more goals from her in the future and I personally have been very impressed with her this season. Ilestedt seems to have brought a lot of stability at the back and is genuinely just a really good player, she reads the game well and looks to be forming good connections with her teammates. I think we have found another gem and are lucky to have someone of such quality be able to pull on the red and the white.
What’s your thoughts on Amanda Ilestedt so far Gooners and how great was her winning goal?
