Liverpool Women crack defensive conundrum – but can they break WSL's top five?

Liverpool are out to prove that defence is the best form of attack this season. Opening the WSL new campaign with back-to-back wins is as good as it's been since the 2017 Spring Series under Scott Rogers, where the Reds repeated the same feat and ended with a top-four finish.

This time around, it's Matt Beard at the helm, and his insistence on defensive stability is demonstrative of Liverpool's evolution this term.

Last year the Reds ended the campaign with a goal difference of negative 15 - that says as much about their lack of firepower as it does about their defensive shortcomings, but the 39 they did concede averages at over 1.6 goals per game.

"We have ambitions to break into the top five," Beard said after triumphing 2-0 over Aston Villa on Sunday, to back up last week's 1-0 Arsenal success. 180 minutes of football - which actually equates to 200 if you include lengthy stoppage-time periods and two clean sheets.

Clearly, tidying up a gaping backline was top of Beard's grand plan as he attempts to transform Liverpool from a middling team into one that keeps pace at the top end.

Beard's expectation was tapered in the sentence that followed at Prenton Park. "We need to keep our feet on the ground," he added, after calling his side's start "fantastic". In fairness, it couldn't have gone much better for Liverpool, who have blunted two of the divisions' most devastating attacking units in successive shutouts.

The difference has been largely in personnel. Beard stuck with the same formation as was deployed for the majority of last season, a back three with marauding wing-backs, but the summer signings of Grace Fisk from West Ham and Jenna Clark from Glasgow City have changed the complexion of their resistance.

Gemma Bonner is