Important Note

If you’re expecting to read Match Reports from January the 30th, and got here via the Club’s Newsletter, please find them here.

Ladies 1st Team

• v. Spalding 1, by Paul Hamnett
• Result: 3-0 Win

We travelled to Spalding in anticipation of a difficult game against our county rivals. In the first fixture we were victorious 3-0 and today we matched that scoreline and therefore did the double on them.

The players were fresh from not playing last week and we got on top early with players battling hard and wanting the ball. Our early pressure soon showed with Vic Poole scoring for the second game running. She managed to score after Becky Riley put the ball on a foot for a short corner. Vic received the ball at the top of the D and scored with a little help from the defender – but she doesn’t care!

The first half continued well for us but Spalding were still managing to cause a couple of problems with their crash ball forward. However we stayed ahead and saw it through to half time.

At half time Vic Poole overheard Spalding’s new tactic of not letting Vic take players on but in reality this was not successful at all.

The second half started similar to the first half and Spalding, along with lacking a clinical finish, kept us out. We were playing the ball round well and creating chances but to no avail. This gave Spalding confidence and they started to apply pressure. Positively the team defended extremely well as a unit and limited shots on target. The reward for this was a second goal courtesy of Vic Poole. Vic picked the ball up in the Spalding half on the right and dribbled past two or three Spalding players, who in fact were so mesmerised by her skill that two of them fell over right in front of her. She entered the D and with the resulting shot hit the back board after going through the keeper’s legs. At the end of the Game Vic said “she has been waiting for players to fall at her feet”.

This spared us on and following some quick and accurate play, Maxine Clarke scored on the goal line. An early ball from the back found Max who lead out high wide left. A crisp turn and a quick look up saw Charlotte Simpson running forward. Max squared the ball and Charlotte then found Ruby Gale whose then shot was blocked on the line. However, Max continued her run forward and tapped the ball in.

There was only three minutes remaining and we saw the game out.

Girlie of the Game: Vic Poole
D of the Day: Maxine Clarke – interrupting the team talk by falling over in changing room

Ladies 2s (East)

• v. Newmarket 1, by Caz May
• Result: 3-1 Loss

Well, following on from the positive way we had played for most of the game last week, we felt that this must be the week! All of the ladies’ teams that were playing had a decent sized squad, hurrah.

Saturday dawned bright, cold, sunny. I had woken up very early, already thinking whilst asleep of what could we do to change it up, what tactics would work to start to beat teams, that let’s face it, are on the whole a little better at hockey! We’ll certainly not give up, use what we do have as well as we could for as long as we could before it broke down. We started our pre-match warm up with some different drills to normal, game tempo, nothing exciting, lots of talking. Not revolutionary, but a role for everyone, not just going through the motions. We knew from the first game against our opposition, where frankly we were poor, that there were chinks in their armour, but we had to get out of the blocks so to speak!

Seemingly the whole team woke up yesterday with the same feeling. As soon as the whistle blew we were in possession, and pushing towards their D. When we lost the ball or it went out of play, the whole team had pushed up, trapping the play in an excellent press leaving little or no option for the ball. Whilst the play for the majority of the first half was end to end hockey, every time we lost the ball everyone was working side to side, front to back, covering one another with at least two players to every break down. This was what hockey should look like. We were able to change two players every six or seven minutes so that there was constant change and best use of pace at the front. Having watched Gemma week in and week out at training, loving being in front of the goal and smashing the ball toward the corners, the instruction this morning had been please be brave enough to do that in a game. Well delight is not the word that describes the facial expression when she did exactly that. Lindum one, Newmarket nil. Five minutes later, the very determined Newmarket centre player placed an excellent strike straight from the edge of the d past Kerry. It was one of those goals that provoked applause from the spectators, a great shot.

Half time was a different conversation to normal, it was a rare occurrence to not be behind. In fact one would say that it really shouldn’t have been one a piece, we should have made more of our chances, but positivity was rife.

We knew that they would start the second half more determined but we had them we thought and just needed to carry on as we were, pushing and defending high, putting pressure around the d. A shot from Antonia very cruelly hit the post and spun round the outside, their keeper saved two corners well, and then about twenty minutes in with a superb run that took the keeper to the edge of the d she fell and was down for a few minutes. Unfortunately once again this just changed the momentum over a little, we lost a little, they gained a little, and a foray into our d scored their second. Despite the best efforts of my girls, I think that Newmarket and sadly us knew that, that was probably enough, we didn’t give up but their heads were up. Final score three one.

At the end of the game, we all knew what an excellent match we had played for fifty five minutes of the game. I told the girls not to be disappointed, we had done really well. However, on reflection, forget that, yes we should be disappointed. For all of the first half and half of the second, we had been in the game and dare I say it on top. We had had the opportunities to score, all of the desire. Importantly we knew that Newmarket were frustrated and not managing to turn it round. And yet a slight lull, the momentum had changed and we had lost, again, all be it a super game. So yes we should be slightly disappointed, that game had been ours to win, we do know how to score goals and play as one unit not several individuals. So once again, and with renewed intensity, I say this Saturday will be the one. Time for us to play consistently well for seventy minutes no matter how our opposition play. Hopefully next Saturday we will have the same or a similar squad, and will take it to City of Peterborough and come home with our longed for points.

Well done everyone, I am very proud of the improvement. Girlie of the game votes were split between several players but joint winners were Rachel, Rachel and Gemma.

Goal scored by Gemma

Ladies 2s (Yorkshire)

• v. Wakefield 4, by Helen Clarke
• Result: 5-1 Win

This was our first game back after the Christmas break and we were looking forward to being back on the pitch. Our match was against Wakefield 4s who are sitting in 10th place on the table so we were hopeful for a gentle start to the second half of the season.

We made a solid start to the match and kept possession in our half from the whistle. Within the first 15 minutes we were awarded a short corner and Jo Siddans seized the chance to score from some fumbled defensive play. A second goal came minutes later from Annabel Hamilton when she made a fantastic break down the sideline. From the back corner of the D she found an incredible angle and hit the back board with force-perhaps the goal of the season! A great way to finish the first half.

Wakefield came back fighting and scored within minutes of the start of the second half. We were perhaps getting a little complacent. This gave us the nudge we needed and we soon regained control of the game. Lucy Oliver and Ange Green made sure of victory with two further goals from Ange and a cheeky one from Lucy right in the lefthand corner. Wakefield played a good game and the scoreline doesn’t really do them justice. Great work from our defence meant that they never really got a foothold in the game though.

A fantastic return after the break with some really encouraging teamwork throughout. Annabel was the well deserved MOM, with a splendid tumble from Tracey Mcilwraith handing her the DOD.

Final result 5-1.

Mens 4s

• v. Leeds University 2, by Alex Cooper
• Result: 4-2 Loss

Once again the Gods of hockey in the Yorkshire League roll their dice on a Saturday and the fate of the Mens 4th team lands face down. Unlike another Lindum team, we set off with a keeper and our captain had his stick, pads and other essential hockey-related paraphernalia, yet unlike them we didn’t have a crushing victory to celebrate at the end of the day.

Leeds University 2 are (were) second from bottom in the division, with only two wins to their name, and yet the team we met at Weetwood in Leeds lacked very little familiarity with the team we met before Christmas. Further to this it could have been argued that the two umpires they supplied lacked a huge amount of familiarity with the game, though in all honesty the end result wouldn’t have looked very different.

The game started competitively and though both teams pierced the other’s D, Lindum had more chances and deftly passed the ball around the pitch to create some possibilities. Ant Gorman, especially, ran himself ragged despite apparently lubricating the underside of his astros prior to the start, meaning he spent as much time regaining his balance and getting up off the floor as he did planning his next run.

In the latter third of the first half a defensive error in the midfield, caused by a Lindum player running with the ball into the opposition, losing it and then leaving his team mates to mop up the mess, resulted in a goal for the home team. Incredibly, within minutes, the exact same thing happened again down the other flank of the pitch (Tom Rounsley saving the first shot on goal but then a member of Leeds Uni, enjoying a highly populated D of his team mates, got the opportunity of a second shot that he duly converted). A little later a short corner against us made it three nil before half time.

The second half produced a much stronger display from Lindum and aside from the odd break from Leeds, usually contained by the players at the back of the formation, play shifted up the pitch. Sadly though goals simply weren’t forthcoming. Stuart Kirk played what one Lindum team captain present at the away game later referred to as “playing patticake with the keeper” in his quest for a goal and it took a short corner to finally get us off the start line. A second goal came our way, again from an attacking short, but not before Leeds Uni had overrun the defence and notched up a fourth.

Comedy moment of the game (if you want to see it that way) came when Grandad had to advise an umpire that a Lindum player putting the ball out out of play meant that Leeds University were then given subsequent control of it. That and a shot on goal that hit a Leeds defender was still a shot on goal no matter how far away from the action that particular umpire was stood.