Tottenham Women ended a three-game losing run in the WSL with a 4-1 win at Birmingham City on Sunday, and Martin Ho still found things to pick at. Birmingham were previously unbeaten at home this season. Julie Blakstad, scoring her first goal of the campaign, put Spurs ahead on 37 minutes. Olivia Holdt curled in a free kick on 50, and Signe Gaupset struck three minutes later. Neve Herron replied on 64, before Victoria Pelova made it four on 84 for her sixth of the season.

Ho felt the lead should have been bigger at the break. Spurs hit the crossbar through Matilda Vinberg and Gaupset before half-time and finished with 28 shots. His issue was defensive. He told SPURSPLAY his side were naive in transition, letting Birmingham up the pitch too easily, and that the set-piece which led to Herron’s goal has to be defended better.

“We know we’ve got to be better on the set-play to make sure we don’t concede that chance, but also the mentality of the group to slow the game down, kill the game, defend properly… I think we had a spell in there too where we were down to 10 players for maybe six or seven minutes, so to manage and control that situation was really good and that shows the mentality of the group is growing. We’ve still got a lot of work to do in that area, but I believe with these kinds of moments we have in these situations, when you face that adversity, if we respond in that way, I think we’ll be fine.”

There was credit too. Spurs rode out a spell of pressure around the 70-minute mark, then played six or seven minutes with ten players, which Ho took as proof that “the mentality of the group is growing.”

Drew Spence passes Millie Bright to set a new WSL appearance record

Drew Spence captained the side in her 217th WSL appearance, moving ahead of Bright as the league’s all-time appearance maker. She almost marked it with a goal in the final minute but fired over.

Alice Sombath, now sidelined with an ACL injury, was one of two players Ho swapped out from the Arsenal game. Spurs sit fourth after the win, at least for now.