New coach Rowson heaps praise on Lady Hornets despite Millwall defeat

“I’m obviously gutted with the result but I stand here afterwards extremely proud of every single player out there and extremely proud to be Watford Head Coach,” Rowson said afterwards.

“I thought the effort that the girls put in was absolutely outstanding, we have to remember we’ve only had two training sessions together going into that game. The result isn’t ideal but it’s a great platform to work from.”

The Lady Hornets were only inches away from taking the lead in the second half, after a period where they played some fantastic football.

“It was brilliant, I definitely can’t take the credit for any of that either!” Rowson told us. “It would have been a different game if the mud hadn’t stopped that shot from Ellie [Mason].

“That would have put us 2-1 up, we know football is all about momentum and I think it would have been a whole different outcome.”

With the next fixture now not until the March 23, there’s plenty of time for the new head coach to shape and improve the squad over the coming weeks and months.

“I was really excited on Wednesday, I came off the training field absolutely buzzing, purely because the girls worked so hard and were keen to impress,” Rowson reveals. “Having now seen them in the game, it gives you plenty of feedback and I’m still massively excited.

“We’ve got six and a half weeks until our first league game. I can now move on from today, really work and knuckle down on fine tuning them.

“It’s a great group of girls here, both attitude wise and work ethic wise, and they’re willing to learn. We can teach them, we can improve techniques and we can teach the game understanding and the strategy.”