The Ladies’ 2s travelled to Sudbury this week with just one goal – but returned back with four.

We had a point to prove in this game. The last time we met Sudbury in the league was our final game of last season. Sudbury came out on top in that game and cost us promotion. We knew it would be tough, but with them having lost to City the week before, we knew that they were beatable.

All fourteen of us managed, by some miracle, to make the trip to Sudbury with minimal wrong turns and arrived an hour before push back as instructed. H arrived without Harley-Joe this week, but instead brought a bucket full of fruit. She’s trying out a new career as a greengrocer.

We started strong, passed well and looked threatening. We made a number of entrances into Sudbury’s D but couldn’t quite finish. Sudbury on the break were dangerous, something we learnt quickly when they pulled ahead after a slick short corner routine. Conceding our first goal of the season gave us a wake up call and we fought back. Sarah picked up the ball in the middle, drove it forward into the D, Dani picked it up on her reverse and swept it in to make it one-one. From this point onwards the passing was slick, the defenders held the back well and the midfield line of Sarah, Annie, Rebecca and Grace worked hard to feed through to the forwards. We attacked again, drove the ball in and around the keeper only for it to be stopped on the line by a foot. Izzy stepped up to take the flick and made it two-one to South. Sudbury quickly retaliated, broke, charged up the pitch and made it two-two at half time.

Half time. Jelly babies were eaten; we agreed that we could take control of the game, we just needed to keep working hard. We went into the second half determined to win.

As Sudbury began to tire, we started to exploit the holes in their midfield and defensive lines. Our defensive line of Ellie, H, Louisa, Jenny and Aoife held Sudbury’s attackers at bay while we worked hard and pushed forward. Grace, Annie and Rebecca stormed up the wings and fed ball after ball through to the forwards. Sudbury’s defence was strong and made life difficult for our forwards. Our third goal came from a well-won ball in the middle by Sarah, driven up the wing, crossed in to the D and picked up by Hannah. After a save by the keeper and a scramble, Hannah slotted the ball into the goal to give us the lead. The pressure was on now to maintain the lead, we had ten minutes to go and all we had to do was hold. We don’t like to make things easy for ourselves, so decided to go for another goal instead. Hannah got our fourth goal after another injection in to the D and a reverse deflection to put the ball past Sudbury’s keeper to secure our win.

Man of the Match went to Izzy for her hard work in the middle. Louisa announced that it was the most she had ever seen Izzy run in the last three seasons. Lemon also went to Izzy for firing a ball in to Dani’s bum. At least it wasn’t Eimear who got hit this week! H picked up a joint Lemon for taking a tumble while tackling.

A big thank you also to Hannah’s parents for coming to watch and her dad for supplying some homemade toffee for after the game.