Luckily for us Jan saved us from missing our match due to Saffron Walden changing the time and venue without telling us. Thanks, Jan - (spoiler alert) these points were thanks to you.

We arrived on time and, after waiting around for the opposition to find keys, we got into the changing rooms. The memo about us playing in our away kit had been ignored by a few of the team but we somehow managed to get most of our players in the right coloured socks (some would say Ellie’s way of finding socks was a little uncoventional). Evie played her debut for South in colourful star socks… Is that a metaphor for her future in our club? After the birthday girl, Ellie, accidentally emptied the contents of her bag onto the floor interrupting our team talk with some laughs, we were off.

Our aim for the match was to do our thing, score a goal in the first few minutes, and most importantly to have fun. And that is exactly what we proceeded to do.

The match started with South putting Saffron Walden under a lot of pressure. Down our right side particularly, we stormed ahead. Aoife, Rebecca and Jess created beautiful triangles leading up the wing. Rebecca took the ball and ran it all the way to the baseline and towards the goal before trying to pass it to our forwards near the penalty spot. On its way there the ball hit an opponent’s leg and bounced off, straight into the goal. One-nil.

We never lost control of the match, keeping the pressure high and playing well together. Our communication was improved altogether and we had a few more opportunities. Our press was great and the opposition had difficulties getting a ball past Dani K-S, Izzy, and Evie. Our second goal came when Sam decided to go full on and run at the keeper herself, somehow getting the ball through her legs and into the goal. The third was a drag flick at a short corner from Izzy, into the right corner of the goal.

After half time we were starting to feel the heat and only having one sub meant we were tiring, but we still kept the pace and pressure high. Our defenders got a bit more action, but Ellie and Lucy stopped any real threat to our goal. Aoife did her thing and managed to outrun any of the opposition trying to get to our goal. Grace and Dani intercepted many balls before they even reached our defenders.

The finale score was three-nil and we went to teas very satisfied with our match, and some cake was had to multiply the happiness.

For her goal and overall performance, with high determination and pressure, Rebecca was rewarded with a well deserved MoM. Lucy got a couple votes for her defensive skills and her boldness, and Dani, Sam, Jess, and Aofie each got a vote as well. The spread of votes reflected the quality of our game.

LoM went to Jenny, who was so happy not to have done anything stupid during the game that she let her guard down and used the socks she had borrowed off Izzy to dry off her legs after washing, which apparently is socially unacceptable.

Special mention goes to Louise, who came to watch our match to cheer us on and even brought her two puppies, who got a lot of attention and made everyone’s day even better.

In conclusion, we did our thing and we had fun, so it was a good day for the L2s.