England 2-1 Scotland: Kim Little says Scots 'belong at World Cup'
Last updated on .From the section Scotland
Scotland proved they belong at the top level despite losing 2-1 to England on Sunday in their Women's World Cup debut, says midfielder Kim Little.
Shelley Kerr's side regrouped after falling 2-0 behind in France and scored their first World Cup finals goal courtesy of Claire Emslie.
"I'm pleased for the team to get that goal and show we can do extremely well against one of the best teams in the world," the 28-year-old said.
"We can take a lot from that."
England lived up to their billing as the third-ranked side in the world in the opening 45 minutes, with Nikita Parris netting the opener from the spot - after VAR ruled Nichola Docherty had handled in the penalty box - before Ellen White added a second.
- VAR knocked wind out our sails - Cuthbert
- Scots have great chance of qualifying - BBC pundits
- Kerr laments 'harsh' penalty but sees 'positives'
- England should have done better - Neville
But Little saw enough in Scotland's second-half performance to take encouragement.
"We have the ability and we have great players - as good as other teams," the Arsenal player told BBC Scotland. "We just need to do that for longer in the match and not just one half."
Little feels Scotland dealt well with the initial thrill of making their World Cup debuts but that the penalty affected their rhythm.
"Maybe a little bit in the first half. I think we knew that going into it," said Little.
"We spoke about that and how to deal with it and I think we dealt with it fairly well to begin with.
"The penalty went their way and that kind of knocked us back a little bit, which meant we kind of dropped a little too deep."
Scotland now prepare for their second Group D match against Japan in Rennes on Friday and Little knows they will have to cut out individual errors.
"Those things happen in games," she added. "It's a team sport, so we'll collectively look at them and I think everybody knows we can do a lot better in those aspects.
"England took their chances when they needed to, but I'm proud that we came out in the second half and we played a different way - we were a lot braver. We built a lot more and created a lot more chances."
