Womens 1s vs Wimbledon W2

The womens 1s faced Wimbledon 2s this weekend for our first home league game of the season. After a slightly shorter journey this week, we arrived to the Nest in time to cheer on the womens 2s in their game against Norwich City.

After a strong warm up, with some banging tunes, the Magpies set for pushback and the game was underway. Wimbledon came at us hard from the off, scoring their first in the first 2 minutes of the game. We countered quickly, pressing the young Wimbledon side well, keeping the play predominantly in our attacking half. Some great link up play lead to winning our first short corner of the game, and with a well-executed straight strike from Jess, our first goal of the game too. We continued to push after the equaliser, but the whistle was blown and the first quarter ended 1-1.

We carried momentum into the second quarter, working well to create lots of chances on goal. Winning our second short corner, in which we slipped the ball back to the injector on the left post, where Beth made a great connection on the ball and the keeper did well to save. We kept working off each other and won another well-deserved short corner. Jess stepped up again to strike and slotted the ball nicely between the posts. Bringing the score to 2-1 just in time for the half time whistle.

We hit the ground running after half time and continued to dominate throughout the third quarter. Stopping Wimbledon nicely with our well worked press and testing the opposition keeper. Another great passage of play won us our fourth short corner of the game. This one put away nicely by a low drag from Fran, placed perfectly between the keepers’ legs. Magpies stayed ahead at the break, leading 3-2.

Going into the final quarter, we looked to carry on attacking well and increase our lead. However, we started to tire and made things harder for ourselves, leading to an equaliser from Wimbledon. Despite a period with two Wimbledon players sin binned, after both receiving yellow cards in quick succession, they still managed to put two further goals past us. Taking the score to 5-3 to Wimbledon. We struggled to regain our rhythm and were unlucky not to convert any of our final few short corner chances. The game disappointingly ended 3-5.

Despite the result, the Magpies can take a lot of positives into the coming weeks training sessions and next fixture away to Bath on Sunday 8th October at 12pm.