5th Sept - Defeated but a Great Start for a New Team

With five new faces and and a summer off behind us, Batley Ladies regrouped on Saturday for the first friendly of the season.

Having lost a few of our regular faces due to relocations, job changes and babies (congratulations all!) it was a half new team that took to the ptich.

The match started off well with a great start from Batley, some great passing a moving and solid marking got us off to a great start.

New keeper Helen made her mark with some cracking saves and found herself facing a penalty in the first 20 minutes. Helen pulled off a fabulous save to keep Batley in the running.

Unfortunately after a bit of confused defending, Batley conceded the first GOAL. This was quickly followed up with a GOAL by Kim Sharples after some great passing work up the pitch.

At 1-1 Batley were upbeat and working well together. Rolling subs were keeping fresh(ish) legs on the pitch and the team looked good and strong.

A short corner awarded to Batley right on the final whistle of the first half brought the whole team up to attack. The well excecuted move lead to Batley's 2nd GOAL of the match by Vicky Almond, finishing the first half 2-1 to Batley.

It was a positive team that returned to the pitch for the second half, tired legs soon got the better of us though and Heckmodwike were able to capitalise on some of our mistakes, despite some great defending by Linda, Gail, Charlotte and Jenny. A few quick goals left Batley trailing.

Helen found herself facing another penaty when Gail saved a goal on the line with her foot (any save is better than a goal!!) unfortunately, the second penalty didn't go our way.

Despite the turn of events, Batley head's did not go down and we battled on right to the dying minutes of the game. A great performance from everyone.

Unfortunately, I was one of the more knackered of the team at this point and have little memory of the last 15 minutes of the game!

The final score was 6-2 to Heckmondwike, a score that didn't represent the fantastic game the Batley played. We should definitely be proud of ourselves after our first game back!

#batley #batleyladieshc #hockey