Bloomsbury got off to a poor start, conceding in the first minute when a Borehamwood long throw evaded all players in the box and was headed into an empty net at the back post. This was followed by a second goal soon after, this time a good finish into the bottom right corner. Bloomsbury were dominating possession but couldn’t find the finishing touch until Alexey came on after 20 minutes, arriving his first shot into the bottom corner. It was 2-2 soon after as Naison got his first of the afternoon, finishing at the back post when a loose cross wasn’t cleared effectively. However, the high scoring game continued, and it took Borehamwood just 30 seconds to regain the lead. Bloomsbury had hardly reset when their striker finished well again, proving the point that any team is most vulnerable after scoring! With the final kick of the half, Naison grabbed his second with an excellent header from a corner. 3-3 at half-time!
The second half was also exciting, particularly the minutes 45 to 70, when the energy levels were high, both teams were visibly desperate to win. Bloomsbury had the lead for the first time in the game when Lamin was rewarded for his hard work and finished well, but once again we were caught out from kick off, this time directly. The Borehamwood player asked the referee if he could take kick off before looping a shot into the top corner from the halfway line, a superb effort! With 15 minutes to play, Naison completed his hat trick with another back-post finish from the right, and Bloomsbury then dominated the remainder of the game. However, Borehamwood had one final attack with two minutes remaining, and the ball fell to their star striker who finished past Tom in goal. 5-5! Before the game was up, Bloomsbury hit the post through Saul and piled on the pressure, but just couldn’t find the winning goal!
Penalties followed and, whilst all hit the target, the score was 4-3 to Borehamwood and Bloomsbury were knocked out in the semi-finals. A thrilling game! Despite the result, both teams showed excellent sportsmanship throughout and could appreciate the quality of the match. It was a shame that either team had to lose the game, and Bloomsbury were particularly unfortunate, but the team represented our club in the correct manner. This is always of equal importance as the result! Tristan was worthy of his player of the match award, giving 100% for his 85 minutes on the pitch. He led by example with the captain’s armband on his arm, encouraging others and showing real quality on the ball. Considering our lack of fixtures over the past few weeks, the team were fit and ready for the battle. It was 90+ minutes of intense football but the determination and will to win kept the boys going until the very end. Defensively we made simple errors, not releasing the ball quickly and not showing game intelligence in every moment, so the focus will be on this during training this week!
We scored two goals in six minutes. The intensity the girls started with was brilliant and shows a massive improvement as sometimes it takes us a while to get into games. The whole team worked very hard, and some of the girls played out of position too and did brilliantly! The best moment was when the girls demonstrated what they had learnt recently. We have done a few sessions on passing and switching play and during the game the girls looked after the ball very well in our defensive third by doing so! It’s tough to choose player of the match as all the girls had a great game, but for this week, player of the match is Poppy. She volunteered to go in goal as well as Bakita and did some great saves, and her decision making was brilliant. Poppy always works hard for the team, and she got two well deserved goals. Next week, we will be even better by fine tuning our passing and doing a little more work on playing quickly through the thirds.
There was an unfortunate penalty miss that would have sent us 2-0 up, a Frank Lampard v Germany World Cup 2006 replica to equalise, and unfortunately a poor immediate reaction to losing our lead to then go behind 2-1. Also, we couldn’t convert our chances at the end despite good build-up/progression to fashion them. Winning the penalty at the start of the 2nd half was the best moment. The reaction to go out and immediately implement what had been spoken about at half time was pleasing to see. Full credit to Max, Adam and Jon for hunting together in packs to win back possession in a dangerous area and win the penalty. Player of the match goes to Archie. Lovely positioning for circulation, rock solid defensively, and a reliable presence in possession. A performance that should give him a lot of confidence going forward! We need to manage the key moments better and use this defeat to fuel our drive to never experience such an undeserving loss again!
The opposition dominated the majority of the first half, creating numerous chances and we were extremely fortunate not to concede first. The team stood firm against the pressure and managed to score first despite it being against the run of play. Tristan Turner showcased great close control as he dribbled across a number of players before round the keeper and scoring into an empty net. However we conceded shortly after a scramble in our box. Coming out of the second half, it was the complete opposite. The team dominated proceedings and created an abundance of chances, hitting the woodwork on 3 occasions before Rupert cleverly got a touch on the ball just before the opposition and was bundled over winning a penalty. Leonardo coolly slotted the ball into the bottom right corner and gave us the lead. It was extremely pleasing to see how the team were adamant in chasing a 3rd goal instead g sitting back and allowing the opposition to dominate. The team celebration at the end was the best moment. As we enter the end of the season, it was great to see each player share a warm embrace with their teammates as they celebrated an important win, once again showcasing the team bond we currently have. Player of the match goes to Noah who adapted well to central midfield. He seemed to always be involved in every midfield battle, was able to win back possession and get the team moving forward. Fantastic!
It was a close game to start with, but we had the early chances. Impact Sub Tara started the scoring and we dominated from then on. Lauryn with her second game in goal did very well and received coaches player of the match along with Tara. Kaya and Kitty received players player of the game for excellent attacking play and goals! A great moment was when O’Miya ran all the way back after a rebounded effort on goal to stop a counterattack. An excellent team performance for the start of this term. It was amazing to hear such positive encouragement from the team, especially from Muzique who had some very silky skills. Shoutout to defence and especially Salima who although doesn’t usually play on defence, didn’t complain and did very well!
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