This was our first actual league match of the season, having been rudely stood up a week earlier for the first planned league game. This gave us hunger in our bellies - or maybe that was the early start and smell of the service station food, which was directly next to the pitch.  

The journey caused trauma to some members of the team, firstly getting lost twice and then adding insult to injury by being stuck behind a tractor for 20 mins……however they made it in time for sticks in! 

We started strong and were immediately in their D after 20 seconds of play. Here we stayed for most of the first half. We kept attacking their goal and were kept at bay only by their incredibly slow pitch (which sadly took a lot of pace off our balls) and the skills of their experienced goal keeper. When the first half ended we were frustrating 0-0, which did not reflect the volume of attacks had on their goal. 

We rallied together for the team talk feeling that time had gone very quickly, when due to diligent timing on the sidelines, it was realised that we had only played for 32mins. Upon querying this, we found the umpires watch “had stopped” and thus the half had ended early - the scientists amongst us did question that surely a stopped watch should have meant the half continued on longer, but it was concluded that Ely must be a time warp zone, for which experiments into this are ongoing. 

The enthusiasm to making the second half longer (in order to add in this lost time), was meteoric, as the sun was now beating down on the pitch, that due to the time warp qualities also slowed down the ball so much that you had to run twice as far. 

The second half started and Emma’s watch made a bid for freedom - earning her LOM, in an otherwise un-lemony game. 

Immediately we started attacking their D again. The forwards Indie, Nicky, Evie and Zara kept driving the ball at goal with great support from the midfield, Emma, Fi, Lizzie and Polly. We had a impenetrable press and excellent defenders; Nicole, Rhian, Hayley, Vicki and Sarah, who not only mopped up any loose balls, but also managed to get some strikes on goal with excellent drives. We could feel a goal was coming and this was eventually achieved with a fantastic rebound off the goalie, which was picked up on the edge of the D by Rhian and smashed into the bottom left corner, sealing her POM award! 

We continued our attack by turning over almost all their hit outs and had multiple short corners; Sadly we started to look like the Australian women’s Olympic quarter-final team, with our poor short corner conversion rate (I’m sure that wasn’t the only comparison!!!). We tried new options but their goal keeper seemed magnetic to our shots (which may also be part of the Ely time warp and altered laws of physics that happens here).

When the final whistle blew the score remain 1-0 and we came away happy as “a win is always amazing and a win”, but also frustrated that the score line did not at all reflect our toil and consistent attack and possession. 

A special mention to our amazing goal keeper Claire, who didn’t get to touch the ball due to her amazing forcefield! 

We look forward to our next meeting on our home pitch, where hopefully the laws of physics may be more in our favour!