A home game in the early afternoon slot, sun shining, Bhav watching: what could go wrong? I mean frankly, very little – we had a great game. Slightly slow start – some blame the sun in our eyes, maybe some post-promotion complacency – but by twenty minutes in we had settled down. Sammy regularly made some great drives down the left wing, and Eloise was solid at the back as per. We had a lot of chances we didn’t convert but eventually Naomi got us a great goal. The back line of Jeanette, Niamh, Anne and Liv, with Katie at the top of the diamond, did well to get through the very high press of the Newmarket 4s. The first half, this admittedly caused us problems but by the end of the game we had them sussed.

At half time we discussed how we should be switching more, calling more, running more – basically just give it a bit more oomph and precision all round. Midfield had lots to do this week – Bethan made some great crosses and Emma had a blinding game and eventually got herself a cracking goal. She deservedly got MoM this week. Now two-nil up, we were more confident – Kat G making her usual silky runs and Lizzie continuing to be excellent at intercepting passes. Zara M was unlucky not to get a goal this week. We executed a number of good short corner routines and were unfortunate not to get more goals out of our practiced routines. I would choose this moment to highlight a slight banana skin, slipping, ‘swing and miss’ moment from our left winger but that would be largely hypocritical coming from a girl who missed an open goal with the keeper on the floor. Apparently there’s such a thing as too much time and too much side line support. LoM to Tess this week for this error, and perhaps more so for going on to antagonise said sideline later in the game.

Louise made some great saves and kept our score sheet lovely and clean.

Emily nearly got herself LoM for asking who scored our third and final goal at teas, the answer being Emily. To be fair, said goal was a brilliant short corner strike – and the aforementioned missed open goal (yes I’m still having nightmares about it) was considered far more embarrassing. Top of the league now tantalisingly close for us – champagne still on ice for now… Roll on the L5 derby.