Date: 13/11/2005
Tournament: BAWFC vs Wandsworth Westside
Author: Jo Santa Maria
Player of the match:

BA WFC line-up:
GK: Sarah
LB: Jo
CB: Preeti + Line
RB: Simone/Belinda
LM: Louise
CM: Stacey + Danni
RM: Nav/Petra
CF: Olive/Livvy/Nav + Char

Everyone was looking forward to the rematch with Westside and the game was every bit as close as the previous time the sides met. Westwide came out strongly in the first half and our defence were kept busy with Line and Preeti combining well to keep the Westwide attack out. A lot of their play was coming down their left side and Simone was kept busy, as was Sarah who played yet another fantastic game in goal. She used the area well depriving Westside of chances whenever they tried to play the ball over the top of the defence. We found it difficult to get out of our half to start with and were having problems playing against the wind but eventually settled in and started playing our game.

As usual, Stacey and Danni combined well together in midfield and seemed to be everywhere at once, one minute keeping out the Westside attack and the next causing problems for the Westwide defence. Char and Livvy kept the Westwide defence busy and although Westside had a lot of possession, BA had the best chance of the first half when a lovely pass through from midfield (apologies to whoever made the pass but I really can’t remember who it was) put Livvy one on one with the Westside keeper. She was unlucky not to score but the close chance inspired us to step up our efforts.

We came off at half time with the both teams yet to score. Amrik’s half-time talk fired everyone up and we came out ready to stamp our mark on the second half. We had the wind with us this time but the sun in our eyes.

We were lucky to get a corner early on and Lou, who’d been having a quiet game (by her standards) up to this point, stepped up to take the corner. It was a great corner but the Westwide defence managed to knock it back out. Unfortunately for them it was straight back to Lou just outside the box and she took a shot which the Westside keeper actually managed to catch, but the ball slipped through her hands backwards into the net - 1-0 to BA!!

Olive came on for Livvy soon after followed by a change in the back four not after that when Belinda came on to take Simone’s place at right back. Olive was doing some great work up front when a tackle by one the Westside players ended her game just a few minutes after she’d come on! Petra came on at right mid and Nav moved up from right mid to take Olive’s place.

Goal number two also involved Lou, who put a great cross in to Char on the right side of the box which allowed Char to weave her way through and take a blazing shot on goal which the Westwide keeper didn’t have a chance of stopping.

Nav seemed to be inspired by her move up front and played well with Char to cause real trouble for the Westwide defence. The pass of the game has got to go to her for her beautiful flick on to put Char one on one with the keeper. Sadly the linesman seemed to think that she was offside otherwise it would probably have been number 3 for us.

Westside did come very close to scoring close to the end of the game when they put a ball through which gave them a two-on-two situation in our box. Luckily for us, Line put in the tackle of the match to take the ball off the Westside forward and help us keep our clean sheet.