The Eagles hosted Twickenham for this morning’s league game. The pitch was dry, the weather was warm but with a chilly breeze and after the warm up the girls were excited to get going.
Both teams started brightly and challenged for everything. With Ella, Ria and Maeve starting in midfield the Eagles battled hard to try to gain the upper hand. With support behind them from the defence of Ruby, Molly and Tabs the Eagles started to gain the upper hand and fire some long balls into space behind the opposition back line. Freya and Lyla made some lovely breaks with the ball but the Twickenham defence was particularly well drilled and the Eagles were caught offside on more than one occasion. However midway through the half Lyla unleashed a powerful shot that seemed destined to hit the back of the net, only for the goalkeeper to make an outstanding save
At the other end of the pitch Twickenham focussed on moving the ball out wide to their right winger and captain who posed a real threat every time she touched the ball. However, good communication and covering among the Albury defenders prevented her from breaking through on goal. But she was able to play some accurate though balls to team mates and Seren pulled off a couple of very smart saves to keep the score at 0-0.
With such a frantic pace to the game, Albury soon made use of their subs bench with Livs, Emma and Bonnie coming on after 15 minutes. Livs pace caused trouble in attack and both Bonnie and Emma looked strong in midfield and had their best games of the season – tackling well and making some lovely accurate passes to team mates.
The second half continued at pace with the ball moving quickly from one end of the pitch to the other. Both teams had opportunities but couldn’t find the finishing touch. A Twickenham corner caused a bit of panic in the Albury penalty area and a half clearance was fired back in by a Twickenham player and it glanced wickedly off an Albury boot and spun away from Seren into the far corner of the goal.
But back came the Eagles and they launched a series of attacks in quick succession. From one of these, the ball was chipped into the Twickenham area and Ella, the smallest player on the pitch, leapt up to nod the ball over the goalie and level the scores. An absolutely fantastic goal and the first headed gaol ever scored by the team! With players being rotated so that the Eagles had fresh legs on the pitch, the last 5 minutes were played out exclusively in the Twickenham half and it seemed likely that the pressure would tell but some fine defending and goalkeeping prevented the Eagles from finding a winner
A draw was a fair result between two evenly matched teams

Star Player : Ella
Parents’ Player : Bonnie