The L3s' first proper away match (not counting one friendly at St Catz and one 'away' game with the L4s at Fortress Long Road) and the whole team was there within a mere five minutes of the arranged meet time. Sadly, no sign of our opposition for a further fifteen minutes…who it turned out had neither the key to the changing rooms nor the pitch and no clue where the caretaker was… At which point there were some mutterings about returning to the train station to make use of their facilities in light of the stuttering start. Eventually the elusive fellow was found and proceedings were able to progress onto the pitch, but not before Lauren had managed to shut her hand in a door! The captain's plea to not have to refresh the team's cold packs EVERY game already ignored, and we hadn't even stepped on to the pitch!

With two wins out of two apiece, as the two top of the table teams at the start of the game, it seemed set to be a good match. Though to the savvy, such as Jan, closer analysis of the teams beaten by both to reach six points probably made South favourites, but still needing to go out there and deliver! And deliver we did! Dodgy wind conditions and sunshine across the goal led the captain, having won the toss (and following team consensus), to choose which end we defended rather than first push back, much to the confusion of the opposing captain.

South's skills on the ball quickly gained possession and set the tone for the kind of hockey we intended to play. Slick, effective passing soon led to multiple opportunities on goal, including several shorts. As per usual, the 3s' Plan A at shorts wasn't working but the alternative of, "Let's let all of our attackers touch it once in the D before Dani finally slots it past the keeper," did work! One-nil South!

Here Saints' "We have three or four cracking strikers scattered across our formation so we don't need to rely on skills" tactic produced a break which led to a short, which was promptly smashed in on an arcing line just curling back below backboard height to take us to one-one. This produced something of a revival of spirits from our opposition. Cue nervous feelings amongst the defense that this could easily go either way at this point. Let's not give away any more shorts… Special mention must go to all involved in our press for consistently stopping dead St Neots's defence's attempts to blast the ball clear up the pitch; no mean feat given the tenacity of the balls involved!

Fear not: after several more displays of beautiful textbook hockey to pass the ball up the pitch, we rediscovered our mojo. Third time lucky Lucy (Tuffers) managed to sink her straight strike off a short between the posts and below the cross bar, at an acceptable height. It seemed our, "Let's go all round the D before we shoot" tactics are seeping out of our shorts into open play, but fortunately Jess Woodhouse did the honours of putting it in the back of the net from near the top of the D.

Note to future team selection; playing three Jess's is fantastically confusing to the opposition and enables your own team to shout, "Jess!" and have a high chance one of them is close…but also leads to stilted moments like, "Jess is on! SWITCH! Jess, *pause* <insert correct surname> looks good!" being screamed from the back of the pitch. Very taxing on a flu-ridden captain's brain…but the switching was finally happening and producing the breaks we had always hinted we were capable of.

We also had the excitement of our second penalty flick of the season. At which point it was quickly established none of us wanted to take it… Perhaps we need to take a leaf out of Shin's book and practice these a bit… Jess Langford gamely stepped up to the plate, to very unluckyily put it just wide of the right post.

Three-one and half time arrived as the following game's players were just arriving. Discussion on remaining focused and not getting complacent was had. Plus how delightful it was to still have two uninjured subs, despite Lauren's further efforts to deplete the club's ice pack reserves after taking a cracker to the knee which was egg-like already by this point! (Lemon vote firmly in the bag, along with the pre-pitch hand injury)

Clearly Saints's captain/coach had far the superior halftime chat, as they came back out all guns blazing! However our defensive line held strong against the sudden change in dominant possession; long enough for the rest of the team to digest their sweets and get back into dictating the game. The second half really belongs to Lucy and Dani. Dani for some fantastic runs and instrumental involvement in setting up goals, and Lucy put in three more! One from another short, two from open play. The girl was on fire! Can I have more of that next week please? Unsurprisingly the MoM honours were shared between our two gallant forwards (N.B. the only two not to get subbed the whole game - fantastic fitness display, ladies!) St Neots nonetheless kept us on our guard right to the final whistle, remaining threatening on the break.

It was really positive to have an equally strong second half, after fading in the latter stages of previous games. After several games littered with near misses and ample chances, it was rewarding to have the quality teamwork and possession reflected in the score line. Though we still had more unconverted chances, which we can hopefully improve upon when we take on Ely 3s next Saturday.