Goal Fest in Driffield

This week we played at Driffield, last year we couldn’t get a team and we conceded - which lead to this match report.

In my four seasons playing for Batley, we have never gotten a full team for this match (I know Vicky, four seasons, time flies when you’re having fun!). This week however, we had 12! A full team, and a sub!!!

This meant that we started the game with a very positive outlook. Driffield made really good use of the space and it was clear that they knew where each other were on the pitch and they were working the ball around us well. We had to work hard to keep possession and to keep them from the break. We were making some attacks of our own, but a struggle with marking meant that when Driffield broke, they broke quickly.

Driffield took advantage of this first and were quickly 1-0 up after overwhelming our defence.

We weren’t taking this lying down though and kept our heads up, determined to get a goal ourselves.

Driffield’s great work getting into space and making the ball to the work was still causing us problems and soon we had conceded a short corner. A straight shot from this, to our dismay, hit the backboard, but the keen eyed umpire and defenders knew that the ball wasn’t in the D when it was hit, the goal was disallowed. We knew we had to get it together and get something from this game.

We began to attack harder, and soon a great run in to the D from Jodi (I think) allowed Ashleigh to sweep the ball into the Driffield net for the first GOAL for Batley, much to the frustration of the Driffield goalie, 1-1.

Bolstered from the goal we continued our attack on Driffield, who were still making some dangerous breaks of their own. Soon we won ourselves a short corner, a pass out to Jodi allowed her to take it round the defenders and fire it towards the goal, Newby picked up the rebound and lifted it into the GOAL for the second time in the game.

At halftime it was. 2-1 to Batley. We knew we needed to tighten up on the marking and talk to each other more. We were losing out on the 50/50 balls and struggling to cover each other.

Driffield quickly took advantage of all of these things as they scored within the first minute of the second half 2-2.

Driffield continued to attack and take advantage of the space on the pitch. We were giving them too much time on the ball and still struggling to mark effectively. Despite Helen making some great saves, soon Driffield scored again 3-2.

We continued to attack too, the game really was end to end, there was no chance to rest. A fantastic clean hit from Tina hit the target, a third GOAL from Batley, 3-3.

Driffield were straight back on the attack still getting through Batley’s marking with too much ease. Another strong attack from Driffield lead to\her goal 4-3 to Driffield. Every time we thought we were getting somewhere they were attacking again our fight continued.

Some great passing in the last few minutes left Gail clear to take it down the pitch on one of her famous runs, she took it round the last defenders and a beautiful cross to Ashleigh allowed her to score the fourth GOAL of the game 4-4! Gail, Fretters and Caz had made a great team working the ball down that right hand side through the whole game.

In the last 10 minutes, something clicked in to place for Batley and suddenly the marking was tight and Driffield struggled to get through, we had attack after attack in those last few minutes. Tina and Jodi did at this point have a small disagreement who was most injured and therefore deserved to be subbed right near the end, much to my entertainment (and their frustration, sorry ladies!)

The final whistle blew with the score of 4-4, both teams deserved points from this match, it was a brilliant game.

MOM went to Fretters for her great work down the right.

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