Chris Church | We have to bounce back quickly

Swansea City Women’s interim head coach Chris Church was disappointed to see his side drop points as they were held to a 1-1 draw at Aberystwyth Town, but has stressed the importance of bouncing back quickly.

The Swans found themselves behind for the first time in any game since November as Niamh Duggan hit a stunning free-kick before half-time for Aber.

The remainder of the game saw the Swans piling pressure on the Aberystwyth goal, but they would require a late equaliser from Jess Williams to level things up.

Church was frustrated that his side could not keep their perfect start to 2024 going as they dropped points in the Genero Adran Premier title race, but felt confident the Swans would respond in the right way.

“I’m not sure how we didn’t win, but that is football sometimes,” said Church.

“When one team comes to set their stall out, come to be defensive and hit you on the counter or use set-pieces, then you know that’s what you could get.

“They executed their gameplan, I thought their goal lived a charmed life at times, but it’s a credit to our players for how they dug deep.

“It now means we have to go and win against Cardiff next weekend, but that is football, you have to deal with this pressure and we’ve got a squad that can deal with that.

“The players know that we are on the right track, we just have to dust ourselves down and get into training this week, work twice as hard and make sure we leave no stone unturned ahead of the next game.

“At the end of the day we are still unbeaten in 2024, it feels a bit like a loss, but we’ve played well, we are scoring goals, we’ve conceded two goals from set-pieces and in open play we are defending well.

“The players shouldn’t be too down, it is a missed opportunity but we have another big opportunity next week.”