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The Manchester City captain, Alex Greenwood, has said she was shocked by Gareth Taylor’s sacking but that she trusts the club’s decision.
Taylor was dismissed on Monday, five days before City play Chelsea in the Women’s League Cup final, and Nick Cushing returned on an interim basis for the remainder of the season.
Taylor is understood to have been let go for performance reasons, with the club believing it will give them the best chance to qualify for the Women’s Champions League. Greenwood, asked whether she would like a more of an explanation, said: “No, because I’m here every day and I work with the staff and the players every single day, so I trust the decision the club has made. I have to.
“I don’t want to see anyone lose their job, not the manager, but it’s a decision that was made and we have to trust in it. We have to move forward with it and the exciting part of it is we have a cup final on Saturday. The mindset quickly shifted to that.”
Greenwood said the players received the news on Monday. She was informed first as captain, shortly before the whole squad were told. “[It was] a lot to process, a lot to digest,” she said. “My role as the captain is to bring the team together and make sure the focus remains the same, which is on the final on Saturday and the run of games we’ve got coming up. I was shocked by the news, of course. I wasn’t expecting that news yesterday but it’s business and this is football.”
Cushing, who won the WSL title with Man City in 2016, starts with four consecutive fixtures against Chelsea in three competitions. He spoke to the squad on Tuesday for the first time and Greenwood said the meeting was positive. She also spoke to the former New York City FC men’s coach individually, as captain.
“I had a really, really good chat with him this morning. He had a great meeting with the team this morning, actually, a really, really positive one, ultimately about winning and what is achievable, what we need to focus on, which, first of all, is Saturday.”
Greenwood said she had not yet spoken to Taylor in order to be “respectful” and “leave him to digest the news”. The defender said: “I have a lot of respect for him. He brought me to this football club, he made me captain of this club. We had some great moments together, so I will speak to Gareth when the time’s right.”
Chloe Kelly’s Instagram appeared to “like” a post on Monday that announced Taylor’s exit, less than six weeks after she joined Arsenal on loan from City, and Barcelona’s former City goalkeeper Ellie Roebuck wrote “what goes around comes around” in a post at about the same time, without mentioning Taylor.
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Greenwood, asked about her experience of working with Taylor, said: “Everyone has a different relationship with their manager. I think some is going to be positive, some is going to be negative. I think that’s just how it is. I can’t speak for anybody else but myself and I had a positive relationship with Gaz.
“We got on well. He brought me to the club, he played me a lot, he trusted in me, he made me captain of the club, which I’m very grateful for, and I understand that sometimes not everyone’s going to feel the same because decisions are made about playing or not playing and ultimately, everyone wants to play football, so at some point, people are going to be disappointed, and that’s how football works.”
Greenwood will miss Saturday’s final as she continues her recovery from a knee injury sustained in December. She said she was “getting closer every day and hopefully the light is at the end of the tunnel soon”.
