Metro Girls Vs Crofton

Hello again from the states!

So, if you have been watching any international news you may have seen that there was a big storm here yesterday. It came and went in about 20 minutes but left many houses without power! Fairly crazy but all the girls have seen some fairly spectacular weather and the weather has cooled down. I for one am grateful of this!
So the time: 6:30. The team: Crofton. The temperature: 81 degrees The pitch: long long grass

Everyone arrived with stories of what they had been up to on the Saturday after the game and their free day. All the girls spoke of their ventures of the past few days, but regrettably for them we needed to get them to focus on the game in hand.

So then the game started and unfortunately our girls were still focusing on what they had been doing for the past few days and we did not seem up to the challenge. Crofton scored 2 early goals, putting us on the back foot and giving us a rude awakening. Our team reacted fast with a good team goal finished by Dori., the game was up and down the pitch with the Defence consisting of Sarah B, Suzie and Lauren seeing a lot of the action. The wing Defence’s, Georgie, Sarah H and Charl were also strong and with the excellent keeping of Mary we dealt with the pressure and started to gain confidence and get possession of the ball. An individual goal by Charl leveled things up and Olivia Wimpenny who had only just come onto the pitch scored another, neatly assisted by Jenni putting us in the lead. 3-2. They got one back, then a good amount of possession held by the attack settled us down with the ball being neatly passed between Emily C, Erin and Sarah C. We changed up the attack to put on fresh legs, and a combination of Fiona, Katie and Ellie worked well with Jenni who drove round the goal to score our next. Score 4-3. We were then put under a lot of pressure and the ball was in the midfield going back and forward for about 5 minutes. Emily S and Hayley were instrumental in this and we struggled to substitute them as they were on the opposite side of the field. Hayley then got a yellow card (which was completely unwarranted) and we were left 1 player down. The ball kept going on the ground and both of the teams struggled keeping the ball for more than 30 seconds. Unfortunately just before the stroke of half time they took the ball in and scored. 4-4

HALF TIME

So the next half bought a change of goalie to Meg. Her defence was now Ellie C, Charlotte Lynch and Lizze who for the first 15 minutes of the game had the ball mostly in their half. Sarah H played particularly well in this period as she had a lot of knock downs and came away with the ball 9 times out of 10. They scored a goal taking the lead, and a good combination of Fiona, Dori and Jenni led to Jenni scoring the next goal leveling us up at 5-5. They scored again and then Meg made 2 saves in succession, one going dangerously close to the goal! Charl leveled things up and again we were put under pressure with the team of Lizzie, Suzie and Lauren doing a great job with Zone Defence keeping them out. Then came a stroke of brilliance – again from Emily Keely. She somehow took on about 4 players and scored a great goal! ( see 3 pics). This put us in an excellent position and for the first time in the game we were leading. 7-6. We could not keep this momentum up and they got 2 back. Our attack were tracking but our team spirit was dented… or so we thought. Jennie scored another putting us 8-8 and the game was ours for the taking. Unfortunately it was not our day. The other side scored 2 more and then spent the last 5 minutes passing the ball around the goal with no intention of shooting. A very solemn end to what was an excellent lacrosse match.

This was an excellent game to watch and we were complimented on how good this team was in comparison to other years with regard to fitness and stick skills. The game was a learning curve for the girls. Winning was not going to come as easily as they may have thought. However, the girls did us proud, I only wish we had a little more determination and resilience as I am sure we could have won the game.

As I like to give out player of the match I would like to give 2 (although again this could have gone to pretty much all the players). Jenni for her smart play in attack – her goal scoring ability and her ability to put defenders on the clear under pressure which won us the ball on more than one occasion. The next is Sarah Hiddleston. She was up for this match from the start and although not on the starting line up, she quickly established her place in wing D. Her transition from Defence to attack was excellent and is one to watch for the rest of the tour.

It is out trip to Washington DC tomorrow. Then our game against Davidsonville Wednesday so for now from me (getting up in 5 hours) I shall write again soon.

As always please post as the girls are going on the internet on this side of the pond!