September 16th 2026. Well done to u15 Girls.

The u15 girls played their first English Schools’ Champions Cup fixture of the new season against Swansea at Lilleshall this evening and what an excellent exhibition of football it turned out to be. Swansea schools have a great tradition in this competition and their current u15 team are very experienced having played together for a number of years, with great success, including reaching the National Plate semi-final last season.

Nevertheless, Wolverhampton entered the game with high hopes after two impressive pre- season victories, but found the visitors difficult to break down and ultimately paid the price when Swansea’s first goal after 20 minutes gave them a firm grip on the match.This was a difficult blow to come back from as Swansea are one of the toughest teams we have faced

and they showed themselves to be very strong in every position.

Already without Jess, our task wasn’t made any easier, when Eesha and Georgia were forced to come off injured but we came very close to an equaliser when Leja hit the crossbar from close range. The game was still very much in the balance when we went into the break losing by just a single goal but Swansea then scored a second goal, from a well taken free kick, almost from the kick off and our backs were truly against the wall.

To their great credit our girls never gave up and Grace Lambert’s fantastic free kick must already be a contender for goal of the season. We went on to dominate the 2nd half and pushed really hard for the equaliser creating numerous opportunities to equalise but unfortunately it just wasn’t our night.

Yes we lost 2-1 but every player deserves credit for the determination they displayed throughout against a Swansea side containing 9 Academy players. There were stand out performances from Grace Lambert who worked tirelessly up the right hand side, scoring a fantastic free kick, and Jess Osborne who was superb in defence.

Imogen Jones is also very much in our thoughts at this time as she is due to have an operation in the near future. Imogen has been a fantastic servant to this team over the past 5 years and the whole squad wish her all the best for her operation and hope that she can get back to playing football as soon as possible.

Two more Group D fixtures to look forward to against Slough and Brighton. Keep up the good work and better luck next time Girls.

Squad:

Poppy Pitt, Issy Campbell, Eesha Sidhu, Trinity Donaldson, Priya Kaur, 

Kyla Stephens, Leja Lopetatite , Imogen Jones, Jess Osborne,

Georgia Hambrook, Amaya Whitter , Samaira Paul, Emma Halford,

Rosie Butler-Hollington,  Nya Nwafor, Grace Lambert.