Fidler pleased by progress
Saturday, 01 November, 2008
Lois Fidler believes that England's win over Brazil will make other teams take notice.
FIFA Women's U17 World Cup
12 midnight (GMT), Saturday 1 November 2008
Wellington, New Zealand
Full tournament schedule - click here
Watch all the games on Eurosport
Lois Fidler believes that England's result against Brazil in the opening game will make the other sides in the tournament sit up and take notice of the determination of her players to succeed.
While many tipped Brazil to outshine England in Wellington, Fidler had confidence in her players and says that they fully deserved their 3-0 victory.
"The girls did really well," Fidler admitted. "Their preparation and their professionalism has impressed me, coming here two weeks before we played our first game helped us to acclimatise and to build the team.
"The Brazilians arrived a little later and there was a lot of hype around them about how well they could play. The mentality that we instilled in the players saw us through, and that was right through the squad of players, the staff and everyone involved. The players really wanted it and they deserved every bit of it.
"I hope that people will start to take more notice of us, but I think there are still people who seem to be surprised by how well we did and perhaps think that it was a freak result. But anyone who watched the game will have seen that we deserved to win it."
With Nigeria the next opponents for England, Fidler knows that it doesn't get any easier and that her players will have to show the same desire to win that was such a feature of their play in their opening game.
"Nigeria and Korea will present very different challenges and I'm sure that Nigeria will be keen to book their place in the quarter-finals when they face us on Sunday, but I'd like to think that if we get the ball down and play to our strengths we can do well.
"It will be really tough for us but we will be thorough in our preparation once again and look to cancel out the physical strengths of Nigeria and do the best we can."
With their first game in the competition out of the way Fidler believes that the nerves associated with the first steps onto the world stage will have subsided to an extent as they ready themselves for round two.
"The lack of familiarity was a telling factor in terms of the nerves of the players; they have been business-like in their approach with a relaxed and focused attitude and we're certainly not taking anything for granted.
"Going out in front of 10,000 fans and the TV cameras, the FIFA protocol for a World Cup game; it was a big experience for the girls and the first 20 minutes was understandably nerve-wracking for them. But they found their feet in the game and started to make their mark."
With the local support growing in number Fidler has also been pleased with the backing that her team has had so far from home.
"Everywhere we go everyone wants to see England play, but before our first game the majority of interest was in Brazil. That seems to have changed a little since then and we're getting more support as we train and around the hotel, it's fantastic that people recognise us and appreciate what we are here to do and we have been made to feel very welcome.
"We went into the game wanting to put on a show for them in Wellington, the home of football in New Zealand, and we did that."