Despite a valiant effort, the Wolverhampton girls were unfortunately eliminated from the National Plate competition in the first round but whilst the result may well be disappointing, they delivered an outstanding team performance which made us all immensely proud. The team, captained by Skye Hines, showed their determination to attack from the opening whistle in an attempt to prevent the opposition from settling into the game and we were able to disisrupt Barnsley's play in the early stages by winning every loose ball. Our players pressed high and quickly, preventing any potential attacks and with Beau Morris Jones and Delilah Hard excelling in midfield, and Ava Mohammed and Ruby Maclean posing constant threats down the wings we were able to create a number of excellent scoring opportunities. Unfortunately none of them were converted, due to a combination of excellent goal keeping and sheer bad luck, and we were left to rue our missed chances as Barnsley took the lead with their first shot on target just before the break.
It was totally against the run of play but that's football and no-one was more surprised than our debutant goalkeeper Sophia Norton, who was extremely unfortunate to be beaten by such a speculative effort which was struck from outside the box.The second half began very much like the first ended, with Barnsley capitalizing on a misplaced pass to score their second goal and at that point it was becoming clear that this wasn't going to be our day. Nevertheless, our girls remained resilient, creating three significant scoring opportunities which would have put us back in the match only to be thwarted by the Barnsley goalkeeper who stopped everything that came her way. With time running out, and with the defensive line of Leilah, Shanay and Lois coping so well, Wolverhampton threw caution to the wind and switched to all attack and ultimately paid the price as Barnsley exploited the open space to score their third with a well-executed counter-attack.
Squad: Sophia Norton, Ruby Maclean, Shanay Nisbett (Our Lady and St Chads), Delilah Hard, Daisy Swanston (St Edmund's), Lois Howard, Beau Morris Jones (Ormiston SWB), Holly Morris Jones (Coppice), Skye Hines (Heath Park), Leilah O'Gorman (Wolverhampton Girls), Emilia Purshouse (Highfields), Ava Mohammed (St Regis).
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