Ipswich Town Women were comprehensively beaten 4-0 by a confident Birmingham City side at the Colchester JobServe Community Stadium this afternoon, their second successive WSL2 defeat.

Blues manager Joe Sheehan was forced into changing his starting line-up with Beth Roe beginning her suspension after being sent off during Town’s loss at Sheffield United last week, while Sophie Peskett was a late withdrawal from the squad, apparently suffering with illness the night before the game.

Natalia Negri retained her place in goal, along with defenders Paige Peake, Maria Boswell and Summer Hughes. The Town skipper moved out to right-back to accommodate central defender Megan Wearing, making her first league start of the season, with usual right-back Grace Neville pushing up into the right wing role to cover for the absent Peskett.

Kyra Robertson returned to the starting XI in central midfield in place of the suspended Roe and alongside Leah Mitchell, with Shauna Guyatt also making her first league start on the left wing with Jenna Dear in the central attacking midfield position behind striker Rianna Dean.

Laura Hartley, Charlotte Fleming, Kaci-Jai Bonwick, Ruby Seaby and Natasha Thomas made up the Town bench.

Birmingham City, starting the game second in the WSL2 table, began on the offensive and quickly forced Town into defensive manoeuvres.

Ipswich were clearly prepared for time off the ball, Sheehan having personally led the defensive drills in warm-up with Neville dropping in next Boswell out of possession to create a back five.

City had their first corner on seven, but Rebecca Holloway’s effort was cleared. A few minutes later, Neville looked to get away with a long ball, but her second touch took it away from her and Birmingham were quick to clear.

On 15 Birmingham’s Océane Hurtré unleashed a rasping shot from distance which Negri had to be at full stretch to push around her post for a corner, from which the visitors went wide.

Two minutes later, City took an early lead from another corner. In a pattern becoming familiar with Ipswich this season, the Blues were able to deal with the initial ball in from the set piece but failed to prevent the second ball in, Chelsea Cornet shooting from the right of the box and the ball going in off the far post, with Negri rooted to the spot seemingly thinking the ball was going wide.

Birmingham continued to dominate play and looked to add a quick second goal, with Town weathering a stormy few minutes after going behind.

On 20, there was a glimmer of hope for the home side when Dean looked to race onto a long ball to go one-on-one with Adrianna Franch, but the American keeper, part of USA’s 2019 World Cup-winning team, was quick to the edge of the box to snuff out any danger.

Shortly after, Franch was able to claim a deep free-kick from Boswell and launch the ball forwards into the path of Hurtré, but Neville was able to shepherd her run towards Negri, the keeper diving bravely at the attacker’s feet to claim the ball.

On 38, Hughes and Guyatt linked up well on the left-hand side to work the ball into Birmingham’s box but the final ball was easily cleared by the City defence.

Four minutes later, another Holloway corner was almost nodded in at the back post. With only one minute of time added on, City kept pushing to double their lead before the break with the last moments of the half a succession of balls into the Town box.

Birmingham continued their stranglehold of the game from the restart and on 50 won another corner, this time through Korean international Ji So-Yun.

The initial effort was cleared by the Blues but Negri was only able to punch the second ball to Lily Crosthwaite, who shot over.

Soon after, Rebecca McKenna was able to stride forward with the ball from her own half before eventually losing it.

On 55, Birmingham doubled their lead. Ji was able to find Crosthwaite on the right and the City 16 went on a wonderful run along the touchline before putting the ball across the face of goal for Hurtré to poke home from point blank range.

Town rallied from the restart and made a rare foray forward, Dear shooting directly at Franch.

A minute ahead of the hour, both sides made changes, with Thomas replacing Guyatt for the Blues and Hurtré and Lucy Quinn making way for Veatriki Sarri and Batcheba Louis for the Midlanders.

On 62, Crosthwaite, a constant threat, skipped into the box but could only shoot straight at Negri.

A minute later, Thomas won the ball on the edge of the Birmingham box but could only put her half-volley high and wide.

Crosthwaite then worked the ball into the Town area and Hughes had to stand up strong against Louis to prevent a shot.

In the 69th minute, Birmingham made it 3-0 and extinguished any faint hopes of Town getting back into the game, Louis firing home from the centre of the box.

Again, Town went on the attack from the restart with Hughes getting down the left-hand side to cross to Dear, who shot just wide.

On 73 Sheehan opted for a triple change with Robertson, Hughes and Boswell making way for Fleming, Bonwick and Seaby. Neville dropped into the left-back position with Mitchell moving to right-back and Fleming and Bonwick taking up defensive midfield duties.

As the game moved into its final 10 minutes, Neville gave the ball away to Ji on the edge of the Town box and she was able to tee-up Crosthwaite to shoot, but the effort was well over. Two minutes later, City made another change, replacing Christie Harrison-Murray with Libby Bance.

On 84, there was a stoppage for Crosthwaite to receive treatment, but the player could not continue and was replaced on 86 with Ava Baker.

Two minutes later, there was a further injury break, this time for Town’s Mitchell, who appeared to be in significant pain. Mitchell was eventually removed from play, supported on both sides as she headed straight down the tunnel and with no outfield subs remaining Ipswich finished the game reduced to 10 players.

With eight minutes of injury time at the end of the game, Birmingham did not let up and in the 96th minute added a fourth goal, exploiting the lack of a Town right-back for Martha Harris to roll home from close range.

The game followed a similar pattern to Ipswich’s opening-day defeat against Southampton, with Town struggling to cope with the speed and physicality of an established WSL2 side.

Despite the scoreline, Ipswich defended well on the whole, however, when they did make mistakes, they were ruthlessly punished by a technically superior Birmingham side, who remain second in the table after Charlton came from a goal down to draw 1-1 with Sheffield United.

The Blades failing to see out the win and Portsmouth losing 3-2 to local rivals Southampton having had a 2-0 lead, means the Blues stay out of the relegation spot by a single point, sandwiched between the other two sides and only two points behind ninth-placed Newcastle United.

Of more immediate concern was the injury to Mitchell, one of the highlights of the season so far, having ably stepped up from right-back into defensive midfield.

With Town’s squad already depleted with injuries to Lucy O’Brien, Ruby Doe and Maddie Earl, and Peskett missing out through illness, a further absentee leaves Town’s options even thinner than they have been in recent weeks with Sheehan having been able to name only four outfield subs today.

Ipswich Town Women are back in action next Sunday in South London, taking on Crystal Palace in their second Subway Women’s League Cup Group D game.

Town: Negri, Neville, Boswell (C) (Seaby 73), Wearing, Peake, Hughes (Bonwick 73), Robertson (Fleming 73), Mitchell, Guyatt (Thomas 59), Dear, Dean. Unused: Hartley.

Birmingham City: Franch, Holloway, Herron, Harris, McKenna, So-Yun, Cornet, Harrison-Murray (Bance 82), Hurtré (Sarri 59), Quinn, Crosthwaite (Baker 86). Unsued: Thomas, Newell, Cooke, McGowan, Mannu. Att: 1,225.

Photo: Matchday Images

BurgessBlue added 18:56 - Oct 12 Well done TWTD for the excellent report on today’s game compared to the pathetic effort from ITFC website. Without Peskett we are toothless and to only have 4 outfield subs is embarrass for a club of our stature. A tough season lays ahead as the teams so far are much more athletic than our ladies
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runningout added 21:59 - Oct 12 a few truths required if we are to be serious like this we should be
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peaky69 added 00:29 - Oct 13 Someone needs to say this - we have not recruited well and will be relegated without better recruits in January.
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