At 5pm on Wednesday 13th October the UBWFC 1s kicked off against Portsmouth in their first home match of the season. Bristol pressed high from the start, keeping the Portie girls boxed into their defensive third. At just 3 minutes in India took the first shot of the game, and its deflection won us a corner. When Portsmouth saw Lynn’s muscular thighs stepping up to the flag they knew they were in trouble. Her delivery was impeccable and Kat met it beautifully, heading the ball into the corner to win her first ever goal for UBWFC. What a start!
Bristol continued to put Portsmouth under pressure throughout the first half, though struggling to break past their very deep back line. We had a long series of frustratingly near misses: a lovely ball from Isabella was scooped up by their keeper; Leah, evidently envious of the other centre back’s success, had a crack off a corner that went wide; Lizzie’s shot went over; Lynn’s free kick hit the post; Lizzie was inches offside off a great ball forward from Leah; India’s shot, following a lovely 1-2 with Steph, went wide. It was frustrating for our keeper and back 4, growing cold with inaction, to behold.
They picked up the pressure as the half went on, though our back 4 always looked solid; shout out to Leila who ran the line like a trooper, always regaining shape. Their number 16 began to look dangerous and skilled, so Lynn brought out tekkers of her own to show her who was boss. The most worrying moment was when she drove at an exposed Kat, but Kat put in a very successful tackle and denied her the run. It would have been even more impressive if Kat hadn’t ended up on the floor with her limbs in the air like a confused turtle. Anyway, their period on top came to an end with Bristol’s second goal. Pressure on their defence from India saw the ball bounced back to Lynn, who shot first time from 25 yards out. As if in slow motion, the whole crowd watched the ball curl into the top right hand corner of their goal. 2-0 Bristol.
Great pressure from our midfield (shout out especially to Big Nance) gave us a strong start to the second half. We had another near chance when their deflection off a Lynn free kick hit the crossbar. Then Lizzie took control of the game for a good 10 minutes, putting sustained pressure down the left flank and nearly having a couple great chances from balls over the top, courtesy of Simone and Steph. However we were not the only team with a talented winger; their number 7 was keeping us busy too. At 60 minutes in Leah made a great tackle to deny her a run, though she must have had a flashback to her gymnastic days because it turned into a (very well executed) forward roll. Emily also did a great job of keeping their winger at bay, even showing off a few skills to break past her down the line. However that pesky 7 eventually managed to cut past our talented defenders, and before Amaia had time to think ‘damn you pesky 7’ she had dinked it over her head and into the back of the net.
2-1 with 10 minutes to go is of course a scary situation, but Bristol kept their cool. With just 1 minute to go Kat made a strong clearance which surpassed their back 4, and Lynn was more than ready. She won her footrace with their centreback to slide it cleanly past their keeper and into the far left corner to make it 3-1 Bristol. Come on girls!
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