Today was our first experiment with a double-header mixed fixture for A and B teams. With the ever growing numbers of players and hockey enthusiasm across the club, how can we involve as many people as possible… Answer = more matches! Luckily, Bishop Stortford were enthusiastic about the idea and so we started off with the B game, comprised mainly of L3-5 and M4-5 players. We welcomed two new players having their first game for South. Saskia kindly agreed to play for the opposition who were short of ladies (our team already being full).

Before push back we paused for two minutes silence in honour of Armistice Day. Then we were off. South were still finding our feet as a team when Bishop Stortford gained an early lead after creating space with some good passes. We picked ourselves up for the restart, woke up a bit and started playing together.

Half time saw us still one-nil down and the half time chat concluded that the 3-1-4-2 formation was too defensive and we needed to get a third person up front. Cue frantic calculations from Louise as she tried to work out how to put this into place whilst maintaining the required five ladies on pitch and ensuring that none of the men spent too long stuck on the sideline. The change worked and in the second half there was more action in the opposition’s D. Nicole was everywhere in midfield. Some great supporting play from Rhi and determined runs from forwards Tess, Avi, Andy and James saw a few shots go just wide. Eventually Avi made a great strike to put one of these into the goal – a great contribution in his first game which saw him a close second in the man of the match voting.

Bishop’s Stortford regained their lead from a short corner. Naka made some great saves to keep us in the game. Jan had moved up into midfield and struck in the second goal, again from a pass by Rhi.

The two-two score was a fair result reflective of an evenly matched and enjoyable game. Thank you to our umpires, Adam, Katie and Sean.