Sat, 27th October - Lyndehurst 1-1 Dunfermline Ladies II
Another 1-1 draw in a game from which we should, potentially, have taken three points back home. Rumour had it that Lyndhurst had had a shaky start to this season and, being old rivals, we knew their game and that we have the ability to beat them. However, on the day, we could muster only 11 players, one umpire and one spectator as we once again were missing some regular team players. On the up side, we did see the return from injury of goalie Susan Short who showed some good return to form, especially in the first half, when she was kept quite busy but managed a few impressive saves. Alas, despite managing to shield a good strike from one of only a few penalty corners won by Lyndhurst during the game, a free player in the circle managed to pick up the rebound and direct it into the net at out right post. What happened to our box defence??
The second half went a bit better for us and there were a few glimpses of good play, especially from Brigette McNeish who tried hard to keep the game flowing, and Carol Wallace finding good form. For a short spell we seemed to step up the pressure but, as has been the way so far this season, we still have to find our form with our own penalty corners and yet again, many chances went begging. Luckily, 20 minutes in, a good piece of play starting with Brigette taking a side-line hit from left to right found it’s way across the front of the Lyndhurst goal line and Gemma MacNeill managed, for the second game in a row, to latch on at full stretch (much more dramatic than the Liberton game though) to the cross and deflect it past their goalie to secure our equaliser.
Thanks again to Bill Ruzzak who attended our match after a late swap to the umpiring plan this week. We still need help from other umpires whilst our regular L2 umpire is unavailable please!
At time of going to press, the vote for MoM was, apparently, still split three ways so a Captain’s decision is awaited for the final outcome; update will be given in our next match report.
Team: Susan Short, Susan Roy, Gill Oswald, Liesl Craig, Brigette McNeish, Carol Wallace, Corrina Mollison, Gemma MacNeill, Laura Nicholson, Lynn Oswald, Linda Wilson,
Sat, 6th October - Liberton 1-1 Dunfermline Ladies II
Although the L2s have come away from their fourth league game of the new season still unbeaten, we were disappointed with our resulting draw this weekend in a game that we should have made our own. The first half was our better half with us, in spells, playing as well as we have done so far this season. Good performances from Gail Kinmond and Brigette McNeish provided opportunity for some nice linking play and youngster Leah Payne again showed increasing confidence and improved form. However, our only goal, which came from open play after 15 minutes in the first half, was scored by Gemma MacNeill. Gemma, who had only stepped onto the pitch less than two minutes earlier when providing respite for Carol Wallace (who was a bit under the weather last week) managed to get herself up into our circle in time to latch onto a square cross coming right to left across goal from her pal Laura Nicholson. The remaining 20 minutes saw Dunfermline holding most of the pressure though Liberton were beginning to settle and get into their stride. Despite our half-time talk finishing with a pledge not to let the opposition settle back into the game, something had happened to us at half time; perhaps it was the quixotic mix of the picturesque setting of the fragrant Jack Kane centre and the obscure sight of the Scottish Afghan Hound Society showing their wares (amid much primping and prancing) on the adjacent grassy knoll, but it was definitely the Dunfermline side who could not settle into the game. Plenty scoring chances went amiss when we could not convert a single one of the many attacking corners awarded to us and it took only one break-away run from the opposing side, from the half-way line right up to our circle, for them to score their goal 20 minutes into the second half. Gail, having subbed herself off just prior to this attack, stood agape on the side line as the Dunfermline defence opened wide up and four or five defenders found themselves out of position and unable to defend their goal or poor Hayley Smith, who is continuing to do a sterling job at filling the Shorty shoes. (Actually, I suspect the definition of “agape” suggests some element of silence but that is definitely not what Gail was demonstrating at that point of the game.) Personally, I blame the Afghan Hounds……..
Many thanks to Mr Ruzzak Snr who accompanied us across the water (and pesky bridge) to umpire our game. Man of the Match this week was voted to be Gail Kinmond.
Team: Hayley Smith, Susan Roy, Gill Oswald, Liesl Craig, Gail Kinmond, Brigette McNeish, Carol Wallace, Gemma MacNeill, Laura Nicholson, Leah Payne, Lynn Oswald, Linda Wilson.
Sat, 29th September - Dunfermline Ladies 2-2 Edinburgh III
Apologies but this will be a quick report due to lack of time: EHC3 is always a tricky draw for us as they match us in terms of skills but they average 20 years younger and so are faster / fitter / slimmer etc etc….. So, with us missing at least five regular L2 players this week, we knew we were in for a difficult time, especially as the ones who had turned up had to, on the whole, play in unaccustomed positions. Suffice it to say we were 2-0 down at half-time following 35 minutes of frenzied hockey (well, they had a player green-carded after 13 minutes and we had one naughty girl, Sam Laird – who I hasten to add does not belong to the L2s and therefore we are not associating ourselves with her miss-demeanour! – though not carded, was given a stern talking to by our home umpire, Mr R Ruzzak, for (I think?) hooking a stick/leg causing a crashing fall). Anyway, more on Sam later…….. Into the second half and we scored our first goal from open play about 15 minutes in. This one was a joint effort between L3 player Claire Fleming, who turned niftily in the circle whilst in possession of the ball which she directed towards goal and our own Carol Wallace managed to beat their goalie with a deflection into the net. The remainder of the second half saw better hockey from our side though we did give away quite a few penalty corners but, for the most part, we managed to apply a bit more pressure on the visiting side. Despite several attacking penalty corners for ourselves, we did not manage to increase the score line. However, just after I had asked Rod “how long to go?” (thinking I might risk a nose bleed and go for glory myself with a visit way up in our faraway circle), “17” he replied. 17 seconds, that is, and what do you know? Supersub Susan Roy who had been resting on the sideline, had been brought back on for a few last minutes UP FRONT!! and she managed to take a free hit which resulted in a crashing through-ball into our circle onto which naughty-girl Sam managed to get her stick to and then trickle (yes, I’m afraid it was a trickle, but hey – they all count!) past their sleeping keeper. All misbehaviour forgiven Sam! Not quite sure why but Man of the Match went this week to me (Liesl).
Thank you very much to Rod Ruzzak who did the umpiring honours for us this week; we are much obliged.
Team: Hayley Smith, Liz Wilson, Gill Oswald, Susan Roy, Liesl Craig, Lynn Oswald, Brigette McNeish, Leah Payne, Carol Wallace, Claire Fleming, Sam Laird, Alice Lamont, Paula Little.
Sat, 22nd September - Kelso Ladies 1 – 3 Dunfermline Ladies
It was a full squad that travelled down to Tweedbank this Saturday to take on the newly-promoted Kelso Ladies side. Things did not bode well when the opposition were first to put their mark on the scoreboard only 10 minutes into the game, when a breakthrough tested inexperienced (and guesting again) Goalie Hayley Smith. However, it was not long before the L2s got into their stride and took control back, scoring a superb goal only five minutes later from open play. Lynn Oswald, playing her first game this season for the L2s at Right Back, won possession just outside our own 25. She then played a lovely accurate, through-ball, into a nicely-created space by Rachel Laing, who picked up the ball, travelled towards our circle and made the pass that Louise Tipling proceeded to latch onto and slip past their keeper. Excellent play! The match from thereon in was more or less ours. Whilst Kelso ladies had a promising squad, their inexperience at Premier level began to show through and we found that we had a little bit extra time on the ball compared to normal, which we were able to capitalise on; we saw much more open, flowing play in this game with youngsters, Leah Payne and Rachel, both showing good form. A penalty corner 10 minutes before half-time secured our second goal. Another good piece of skill actually, with Susan Roy and Gail Kinmond moving the ball cleverly together to allow Susan to strike home. The second half showed much the same, though we did win a dubious penalty flick which Gail sportingly – some would say spectacularly – missed! Not to worry, a third goal was to be had, again from good open play, when the ball ran through to out attacking circle and, following a wee scramble, we think Linda Wilson was the last person to touch the ball, though Rachel was close to hand! So following the good start made away to ESM the other week, we feel we’ve put in another good performance to get our first three-pointer of the season. As with the last game, since everyone’s performance was spot-on and commitment high, it was a difficult decision to choose Man-of-the-Match and so a 50/50 vote sees Leah Payne and Susan Roy sharing that accolade this time. Thanks again to Fraser Johnston for agreeing to become our appointed umpire……… hee hee, only kidding! Please see the Club Noticeboard for that vacancy.
Team: Hayley Smith, Susan Roy, Gill Oswald, Liesl Craig, Corrina Mollison, Gail Kinmond, Brigette McNeish, Carol Wallace, Gemma MacNeill, Leah Payne, Linda Wilson, Lynn Oswald, Louise Tipling, Rachel Laing.
Sat, 8th September Erskine Stewarts Melville 0 – 0 Dunfermline Ladies
History repeated itself once again last Saturday when the Ladies second team opened the new season with a no-scoring draw against ESM (the second, if not third time in a row this has happened now) and we have been happy to come away with this result each time. ESM generally field a younger, fitter (more organised?) team than us, so to return back home undefeated is our main objective at this point in the season. This year we can be especially pleased with ourselves since we were missing five regular team players (two unavailable, three to the Ladies 1 st team), not to mention both of our Goalies (Susan Short and Kirsty White who are both carrying injuries). With this in mind, we had three players “guesting” from the Ladies 3s who did not have a game themselves this week. Mo Howitt and Claire Fleming both played “up-front” due to a sad lack of strikers within the L2s pool (the rest of us have progressively moved back a pace over the years and so all should probably now be sweeping the goal line or possibly be playing even further back than that ie “Left Back” in the changing room! Anyway, both girls put in a spirited performance and showed a good account of themselves, though Mo needs to gain a wee bit more experience in the art of substitutions – no, you can’t just run off the park coz your wee finger got hit – woosy! ; and Claire needs to realise that when we bring on a sub from the sideline, one should not automatically run off the pitch, assuming it is oneself who is being subbed!! Now, onto our third guest, Hayley Smith , who after only one friendly/practice game playing GK – really! - stepped up to the mark for us and donned the protective garb…. and despite pre-match nerves, didn’t she do well? The first half saw a wee bit of action with Hayley showing us how quick she can be on her feet when she demonstrated excellent shielding action with her pads coming together very quickly (eh…. Oo-err missus?). She also managed to come-off her line a couple of times too. In the second half, she was put under more pressure when ESM took advantage of our flagging fitness levels and stepped up their attack; Ms Smith once again did well, dealing well with a defence which was a little more disorganised in this second half and also fielding a couple of pretty hard strikes from open play, not to mention (I think?) three penalty corners. Whilst we did see our usual stalwarts putting in their usual good performances (notably Gail Kinmond ) it was Susan Roy who came away as our first Man of the Match of this season. All players agreed that MoM was a hard-call this match as really everyone had a good game, with all players putting in 100% effort and absolutely no-one being shouted at for “not getting back” (that’s the polite version!). So, all in all, a promising performance and a good start to our season.
Many thanks go to Bill Ruzzak who travelled over to Mary Erskine’s with us to umpire.
Up to this point, we still had a vacancy for team captain as no volunteer had yet made herself known. However, I’m happy to report that a replacement for me (Liesl) has been found following a post-match team “discussion” and this season’s captain is to be Gill Oswald (yeeha!). Gail Kinmond will continue in her role as player/coach and Susan Roy will be vice-captain. Also, Corrina Mollison has agreed to be the keeper of the purse.
L2 players should note that they need to check their email as new procedures / instructions for this season’s arrangements have been agreed and posted out to everyone.
