Ipswich Town Women travel to face Portsmouth at Havant & Waterlooville’s Westleigh Park this afternoon for their biggest game of the season so far (KO 2pm, live on YouTube).
The Blues remain at the foot of the WSL2 table in the single relegation spot, three points behind second-bottom Pompey with the Hampshire side having played a game more.
A victory would lift Town above Pompey on goal difference, while defeat would leave the Blues six points adrift of the teams above them.
There have been signs of positive progress under interim-manager David Wright in the last fortnight with Town drawing 1-1 both at home to Bristol City and at Newcastle United, two sides chasing promotion to the WSL.
"Really pleased, we watched the game back and we’ve reflected on it,” Wright told >TownTV regarding last week’s game in the North-East. "We generally do that. We do team and then we go through the unit stuff as well.
"From the girls, it’s been great for me to see how they’ve executed what me and staff are asking them to do in such a short period of time.
"It’s great, the information that we’re giving, they’re trying to execute it and, hopefully, the level of that execution will keep going up the more we practise it, the more they understand it, so it’s exciting.”
Town continued their mid-season strengthening with four further additions on deadline day - keeper Lysianne Proulx, forward Princess Ademiluyi, midfielder Malaika Meena and right-back Nelly Las - taking the total of January signings to nine.
Wright says the existing squad have helped the new players to settle into life at Playford Road.
"We’ve got new faces in the building, so in terms of the group, and I think I’ve said this on a few occasions over the last few weeks, how good the group have been in terms of welcoming the new girls,” the former right-back added.
"It’s difficult as a new player coming in, it doesn’t matter how confident you are going into a dressing room with another 25 different people that you don’t really know.
"The quicker they settle, the quicker we’re going to see the qualities that we’ve seen, and that’s why we’ve recruited them.
"And then it’s just myself, them getting to know me, me getting to know them and then working with them and helping them understand how I see the game and how their qualities will fit into it.”
Wright is delighted with the recruitment carried out by incoming technical director Sean Burt and general manager Rachel Harris during January.
"Really pleased,” he said. "Sean and Rachel have done a great job and the girls that have come in will really boost the quality that we already had in the group, will make the group even better and, hopefully, move us forward to where we want to go.”
Looking ahead to today’s big match, he added: "It’s going to be a difficult game, Both of us are at the foot of the table, so we know it’s going be a difficult game.
"But the girls should take massive confidence in terms of the last two. We’ve gone up against two excellent teams in Bristol City and Newcastle and have gone toe-to-toe with them and we could have come out with more points than we did.
"So we should be really confident going into this game. Concentrate on us and how we’re going to play it and let the result take care of itself.”