Women's 4s 6 - 2 East London 2s (A)

While we all know Lara is a lovely human, even she couldn’t contain a dirty little cackle of glee at my misfortune when announcing Saturday’s DOD results… but on this occasion I probably have to concede that a series of misdemeanours that effectively allowed me to complete, ‘What not to do in a hockey game’ bingo do mean I deserved the clean sweep of votes this week.

Things started well during the team talk when I flagged up how to spot their most influential player: “She’s the one with the orange scrunchie”. As we found out shortly afterwards when we saw them warming up, this was apparently a team thing and every East London player was wearing an orange scrunchie, so perhaps not the useful coaching insight I’d studiously prepared in the car while my chauffeur did extra laps of Stratford owing to her inability to follow simple sat nav instructions correctly. 

We warmed up and were all ready to go, only to be told as we reached the gate of Lee Valley Pitch 2 (sidenote: not a place to spend your Saturday afternoon if you enjoy passing a hockey ball, dribbling a hockey ball, or staying on your feet) that our game was going to be delayed by about half an hour. So out came the backyard cricket, and bowling unplayable leggies at proud MCG member Charlie G arguably ended up being the sporting highlight of my afternoon. 

It took us 15 minutes or so to actually create a meaningful attack in the opposition half, but Charlie picked their left half’s pocket and delivered a perfect “Gretzky” pass (Google it, kids) across the goal, which Carole swept home and immediately proved her ‘dodgy ribs’ were fine with a standard fired up celebration. 

The opening goal seemed to give us more confidence and the second came shortly after, with Swin-dell flying upfield to finish off a counter attack move with a deft touch into the netting. 

The satsumas looked a little shell-shocked and we kept the pressure on with more shots on goal, and some shots off goal (Tegan definitely looked much sharper and more awake than last week, but maybe 4am still isn’t quite early enough for bed if you miss from a yard?). And then we won some corners, and one ended up in a stroke… and you should never, never, never miss the target from the penalty spot… but I did. 

It should probably also be mentioned that at some point during this spell I picked up a totally deserved green card for a reasonably dodgy tackle as East London broke out from a penalty corner, but was also viciously taken down by an invisible turf monster just at the moment I was clean through on goal. Almost as vicious as Lexi going back to the club and spreading malicious and inaccurate gossip about cards being issued for dissent... 

Maddie and Sunny were playing calmly out of the back and comfortably finding passes into the midfield pockets. Stacey and Lar were linking up nicely down the left, and in the moments where we did manage to release Evie T and Em down the right they both gained territory with ease and delivered some good balls into the circle (Em’s successful forehand hit to airshot ratio is improving week on week, giving us all a valuable life lesson that you’re never too old to learn new things). 

At 2-0 up as the second half began, it wasn’t long until the standout goal of the game. After getting her eye in at backyard cricket, Charlie G had been pinging amazing passes around the park all afternoon and she delivered an absolute peach from the right, which Bing skilfully redirected into the side netting with a perfect touch. Worldy. 

At this point we briefly let East London back into the game. Lexi made a number of incredible saves in both halves, but was eventually beaten by a masterful reverse stick deflection on a defensive corner by… Maddie. Oops. Don’t worry - just to make myself feel a bit better about everything I made sure I got the last touch before it rolled in. They then earned a stroke when it hit the foot of the post player (guess who) on the line on another penalty corner, which they calmly dispatched to bring the game back to 3-2. Eek. 

I was put through on goal again, I obviously missed the target again. We got some more corners, eventually called the drag flick Bing had been hankering after all game, she ripped it into the net and everybody got excited. At 4-2 up things started to feel a bit more under control again and we actually put some really nice hockey together, with lots of connected passing and some calm play in the attacking circle. 

In the final few minutes my afternoon briefly improved and then swiftly worsened again. At long last I remembered that you can’t backstick an upright reverse… so I went old skool and it worked - sorry for shouting at you to move out of my way Carole, and thank you for the sarcastic analysis on my tekkers after the game Stacey and Evie T. Shortly after my redemption moment, I was blown up for something, again. I (genuinely calmly and politely) pointed out that the ball had actually just hit my hand, which as we all know is part of our stick. The umpire looked extraordinarily put out by this helpful feedback and dramatically brandished a yellow card from his pocket… so back to the naughty step I went while quietly muttering various unpublishable things under my breath. 

On the last play of the game we won a corner and even from the bench we could all see there was no way Carole wasn’t flicking it. Whatever Bing can do, Carole can also do. The flicking comp is still very much alive for our strikers. 

I’m reliably informed that everyone else in our team had quite a nice afternoon, so that’s good. Apparently some of the youth will also be in Infernos next Saturday night if anyone’s looking to get a full W4s 25/26 season debrief after our final game against Wapping next weekend. 11am on Pitch 1 - see you there sports fans. 

POM - Bing

DOD - Clean sweep for moi