The L4s embarked on their first game of the season against St Neots and their newly refurbished pitch…. It has less flooding than previous, though not sure this is an indictment of the quality of the refurb or the state of the current dry climate. It remains as slow as previous encounters. 

Elly B commented on the subbing plan that AI had a few teething issues creating it: El Capitan Becky pointed out that she had done this plan, cheers Elly, as AI couldn’t yet deal with the concept of screens! 

Martha turned up in red socks and this narrowly pipped Elly (and Becky) to LOM. 

It was a barmy 23 degrees, which we discovered is probs a few degrees warmer than most people prefer when playing hockey, but we are seasoned professionals in this heat now, so we came out of the blocks fast and put in a lot of effort from the outset. 

Immediately we were attacking and pressuring the opposition D. There was some fabulous passing between the inners of Holly, Lilly and Mollie and they were getting some lovely passes to Sophie, Naomi and Amy up front. Hattie was stellar in the number 10 position attacking and intercepting their clearances in equal measures (well earnt POM). 

The screens of Becky, Victoria and Fi were distributing from the deeper midfield and despite it being the first game back you couldn’t tell, as they, with the inners were running everywhere! 

There was a short corner for ourselves, sadly sailed past the left post and then immediately a short for them on a counter run (no one was quite sure what this was for but hey ho). Julie saved this on the post and distributed to Martha who got the ball straight back out and up field. 

Poor Martha did a fabulous bit of hockey putting the ball onto their foot when they were attacking to void the attack and then got reprimanded by the umpire for saying the word foot when the oppo kicked it towards goal without a whistle being blown! We pointed out that Martha was one of the least aggy people on the pitch and the umpire had to agree with us! 

We went to half time 0-0 and needing some sweets. 

We concluded at half time that it was 75% attack and possession for us but we just hadn’t converted and we needed to pressure on goal more. So that’s what we did! 

The inners and forwards kept battling forwards and there was some lovely passages of play and teamwork passing. 

When they did break through it was mopped up beautifully by Ellie, Elly, Julie and Martha, who also were passing around the back and distributing incredibly! 

Then there was the most bizarre passage of play in the game just to keep poor Lydia’s concentration up. 

A short was awarded for maybe obstruction but no one really understood, St neots set up, passed out, fired in and Lydia saved immediately but it got stuck under her pad: legitimate re award. 

St neots gather around to have a little conflab….cue reminder of the rules from us, no conferring at re-awards!! 

Then the next short, sails past the designated receiver to the backup, Fi running 1 engages the backup (within the 25) they pass forward and she chases them and engages them still and tackles, cue re-award 2 because her mask is still on. Mini discussion about when was it appropriate to take off you mask when tackling, Lydia points out that some of us (Fi) are old enough, we never used to have masks in shorts so are not used to having to take them off, sealing the point made by Ellie R earlier: the 4s have a bimodal distribution to their age ranges ;). 

Everyone agrees that the mask thing was a bit daft but hey, cue PC 3, re run the whole thing, Re-award, no one knows why again. 

PC 4, Lydia saves, re-award for who knows now. 

PC 5, Lydia saves again (hero) and finally the ball gets past the 25! 

We promptly then got our own PC and Becky struck it beautifully, but it just clipped past right post sadly. And then the final whistle blew to leave us 0-0. 

It was a good game with good quality and a lot of positives to work on and we will beat them I'm sure at the cooler long road fixture in 12 weeks time! 

TL:CBA to read: 

(not generated by AI for Elly’s pleasure) 

We were the better team.

Their pitch is slow. 

We played well together and have an exciting season ahead. 

5 PCs in one go is too much for anyone’s brain. 

Well deserved POM for Hattie (but huge spread of votes across whole team showing excellent team efforts).