“Just another mile in the marathon” – Charlton boss Karen Hills speaks

If Karen Hills can take her beloved Charlton Athletic up to the top league, the WSL, it won’t be the first time the head coach has achieved this feat, having previously taken Spurs on the same journey.

She tells Helen M Jerome about the Addicks’ remarkable season, while looking forward to their upcoming FA Cup quarter-final against the mighty Liverpool, and fondly reflecting on her abiding friendship with Gotham’s head coach, Juan Carlos Amoros.

Arguably the most exciting league in football right now is WSL2, where Charlton still sit on top, but with Birmingham City and Crystal Palace snapping at their heels, and Newcastle floating just below them.

They’re all vying for first or second place and automatic promotion to the WSL, with the third-placed team going straight into a playoff with the bottom club in the WSL. This is winner-takes-all territory, and the Addicks have been almost comically consistent in their table-topping, having gone 27 games unbeaten until this last stretch of the season.  

Having played for Charlton across six highly-successful seasons, Hills moved into coaching, first as assistant coach at Barnet, then as coach at Tottenham Hotspur.

This part of her story is key to understanding her resilience and true grit, as she helped take Spurs upwards from amateur status, through four tiers to the WSL, as joint head coach with Juan Carlos Amoros.

Hills has since been at Charlton for a remarkable five years, building them into a team that’s hard to break down, and even harder to beat.

The next few weeks are crucial, as they host Liverpool in the FA Cup – a tournament that Hills won as a Charlton player – and they make that final push to secure promotion to the WSL. And she’s only too aware of the pressure and the prize…

Obviously today was a bit of a blip [losing 3-2 to Crystal Palace]. But you’ve been incredibly consistent all season.

What’s been the secret of that?

We’ve just been very solid in terms of the way that we play.

We’ve taken our moments.

Out of the top four or five teams, we’ve been the team that’s had probably the least possession within games, but we’ve got solid discipline shape that allowed us to then hit teams in moments, and we then have been able to take our moments.

Today we tried to take the game to them because we felt that they’re a very good ball-playing team and we needed to try and match them and not be on the back foot straight from the off, and I think the players did that.

So yeah, it’s about just making sure that we go back to basics, keep doing what we’re doing, trust in what we’re doing, first and foremost.

You don’t go 27 games unbeaten and then obviously it all sort of unravels.

We have to look at the teams that we’re playing against.

A lot of teams strengthened over the Christmas period, brought in some fantastic players.

We brought in a few players as well to strengthen us.

And now it’s just the business end of the season where everyone is fighting for those top places.

And we obviously put ourselves in a fantastic position.

We’re still in a fantastic position.

And at the end of the day, it’s just another mile in the marathon.

That last game of the season is unmissable, isn’t it, you against Birmingham.

It’ll still really be in your hands then, won’t it?

Yeah, absolutely.

All I wanted to do is make sure we came here, and we put in a performance today.

There was a lot of noise outside that at the end of the day we wanted to make sure that we tried to win this football match.

We beat them at the start of the season in the opening game, and it was a tight contest where we beat them 1-0. We knew that they’ve definitely strengthened, they’ve got the momentum behind them, and I think we needed to recognise that.

And today I thought we did and I thought we played our game.

I thought some of the football we played actually was very good in that first half.

And we obviously got the early goal.

I think the sucker punch come when they scored just before we went in at halftime.

However, we needed to regroup, and I thought the players did that, we made the changes.

We scored two set pieces, but we also need to look at how we’ve conceded the three goals today and they came from open play against a good side who have got very good individual 1v1 players.

I think we needed to do better in those open play moments and that’s something that we’ve prided ourselves on all season.

So we’ll look at that, we’ll reflect on it and make sure that we come back better.

Looking at the bigger picture, because you’ve been involved in this league with Spurs as well, it feels to me, as an outsider looking in, that the quality has gone up exponentially.

Do you think this Charlton team seem much better than maybe the Charlton team of when you joined?

Yeah, absolutely that’s been my goal, that’s been my aim.

I’ve been here five seasons now and ultimately when I took them over they were part-time.

We went full-time and we’ve been able to build a very strong culture within the team.

I’ve got an unbelievable group of people first and foremost in that changing room that are all working really, really hard.

There’s no getting away from the fact of we probably haven’t got one of the biggest budgets in the league in terms of the players that we’ve been able to bring in.

But what I would say is I’ve got a group of players that are working every minute of every day doing exactly what I’m asking them to do.

And when you have a group like that and they’re willing to run through walls for you, I think that’s so, so important.

And I’m super proud of every single one of them.

It has changed a lot over the past four or five years and rightly so; the game deserves that.

WSL2 does deserve a full-time league and you’re seeing the product on the pitch getting better and better week in week out.

So, it’s exciting and if you look across the whole league, actually any team can beat anyone on any given day, which is unique.

I think that’s what the WSL2 is all about at this moment in time.

And we’re fortunate to be at the right end of the table.

And ultimately we’ve got two games left.

Our job and our focus now is to work as hard as we can in training and try and get us over the line.

When you look back at your career as a player and a head coach at all the different places you’ve played and coached – obviously playing for Charlton as well – if you manage to get up to the WSL, how would that rank amongst all your other achievements?

It will be up there. By far one of my greatest achievements.

Because to do it with one team, but then if you have the chance to potentially do it with two teams I think that just goes to show the work that goes on behind the scenes, the dedication from myself, my staff, the players.

But it takes time to build a team. It took me time at my first club, and it’s taken me time to get this team to where they’ve got to at this moment.

If we continue on the path that we are, then we’re going to put ourselves in a fantastic place at the end of the season.

But whatever happens at the end of this season, I’m incredibly proud of my journey and what I’m achieving at this moment in time.

Looking ahead to next weekend, pretty exciting, the Liverpool FA Cup game.

Have you been watching much of them, their season plummeted and then is soaring a bit now?

Yeah, they’re Liverpool, the brand, the club, the name.

It’s fantastic for us as Charlton to welcome Liverpool to the Valley next week.

We’re really excited.

It’s an opportunity to come away from the league and that sort of pressure of the league and we can go and play with freedom.

We can go and enjoy the experience.

It’s a quarter-final of the FA Cup and every team wants to be in the next round and we’re certainly one of those teams, but we know it’s going to be hard.

We know Liverpool are a top side. They play in the WSL1 which is what we’re all striving to be in.

So it’s an opportunity for these players to play with courage and bravery and the quality that they’ve got, and I think it’s going to be a really good game.

One last thing: do you still keep in touch with Juan Carlos Amoros, because he’s doing well at Gotham isn’t he? Did you see him when he came over here for the Champions Cup (right)?

[Smiles widely] Yep, I went and met Juan, and he actually texted me today to wish us luck.

We’re on a text conversation quite often.

He’s doing some great work over there.

But ultimately, yeah, he’s doing what he’s doing and I’m doing what I’m doing.

But we’ll always be friends, and that’s a friendship that will last forever.

Photos: Helen M Jerome, Instagram

Charlton play Liverpool in the FA Cup at the Valley on Sunday, April 5, kickoff 14.30, with coverage from 14:00 on TNT Sports 2

Match tickets here: https://booking.cafc.co.uk/en-GB/categories/Womens%20Home%20Games