The pre match omens were looking less good as we had a small squad of 12 with players playing slightly out of position and England determined to just keep raining. However, it was clear that a Friday evening pizza night is the key to success as we made it two wins in a row with a 7-0 victory over Newmarket.
The first half started with Liv managing to fall over twice in the first few minutes before she then remembered how to play, luckily Emily got us started with the first of her goals in the 8th minute, neatly slotting it in at the back post. Not long after, Charlotte made a gorgeous run down the line, setting Mo up for an easy tap-in at the back post. The Newmarket player looked less amused at this as a few moments earlier Mo had been spotted sharing a coat & having a cosy sideline chat with the opposition (someone needs to keep any eye on her to make sure she’s not switching allegiance).
That’s how it stayed for the first half, the fight for the ball was beautiful to watch and you could tell everyone was determined to keep the score sheet clean. I (Zoë) decided to take a tumble and try to wipe out the opposition with my legs, unfortunately, my head ended up doing most of the work, but no harm done—we carried on.
A positive team talk fuelled by a selection of sweets lead us into the second half determined to increase the goal count.
First a goal summary: Goal 3: A short corner gone slightly awry, but Em found her stick in the rebound and poked it over the line. Goal 4: Em was promised no brownies for tea unless she scored a hat-trick. So, naturally, she went and did just that, somehow getting another one (the details are blurry, but it counts). Goal 5: Another short corner, this time hit by someone, saved, rebounded by Zoë and then Rhi stepped in with the final push to get it in. Goal 6: Rhi again, as Liv whipped it into the D, Rhi sent it to Mo on the back post, Mo flicked it back out, and Rhi finished it off—classic teamwork. Goal 7: A beautiful strike from Hayley, who sent the ball into the D where Daisy deflected it into the top corner. Wonderous to watch. But what happened in between all those goals?Liv, originally complaining about playing at screen, decided to stay there because no one was marking her. She took full advantage, making lovely runs and firing balls into the D. (Next match, if someone marks her, she’ll be back in midfield faster than you can say "hockey".)
After all these goals we’ve forgotten about the defence which is a mistake as the back three of Rhian, Maegan & Hayley were rock solid. Maegan earned herself POM with some seriously tough defending and impressive runs up the pitch. Rhian made herself chuckle mid game as she came up with her POM nomination rhyme for Maegan (Maegan running the show like Faegan – wow it’s like Shakespeare is on the team). Rhian was absolutely not letting Zehra touch the ball as although the call came from Zehra that she was on it, Rhian dove in ahead and got there first. Newmarket had a few short corners, but our defence was impenetrable.
Hayley came up from defence to take a few attacking short corner hits and in one of them fired it straight at my head as I ran towards the back post. Luckily my reaction skills were on point, and I hit the deck the quickly and my head managed to last another day (Hayley I’m sorry if I’ve offended you in some way – let’s talk it out next time instead of using violence). Anyway, this earned her LOM with multiple votes. The Newmarket team complained about the pitch being slippy. Well, no kidding, it was raining and we were all sliding around. Rhi had a few falls, because what’s a game without her signature tumbles?
The final whistle blew and we were a happy team. Maegan made us some delicious brownies and proved Freya wrong as the night before Freya had had little faith in Maegans baking skills. Luckily these brownies were nothing like ‘crumbly cookies’.
Looks like pizza & brownies are the key to success so that’s what we’ll be doing from now on.