Crystal Palace Ladies FC

The U13 Reds arrived at the nomadic Croydon Girls pitch at Club Langley in understandably positive mood given their extended unbeaten run to find the game was to be played on a very small pitch, a factor that was to affect the quality of the game for both players and supporters.

With the usual starting line up taking to the pitch, the game began at a good pace, with Croydon, as usual, playing a pressurising game, which is easy to do on such a small pitch, however CPLFC had far better attacking progress with Mia L and Hannah Mc making headway on the wings and Rebecca winning the majority of her battles with her marker.

The small pitch did not give any of the team any room for error and despite their best efforts, passes from the back 3 of Emily, Lucy and Hannah W rarely found their intended midfield recipient and mis control from any player quickly resulted in the ball leaving the field. Croydon’s approach of long balls kept the defence on their toes and at times the closeness of the back 3 to Rebekah in goal caused some anxious moments with back passes.

CPLFC deservedly opened the scoring with a fantastic strike from Rebecca, striking the ball cleanly from a right angle on the right side of the box into the far corner of the goal with the goalkeeper bewildered at the speed the ball went past her.

As the half wore on the small pitch (have I mentioned it was a small pitch ?) resulted in the midfield being effectively bypassed and outside of forays down the wings from CPLFC the game was pretty turgid, Croydons goal kicks rolling through to Rebekah and Rebecca, Mia L and Hannah trying to breakdown the deep lying Croydon defence.

Croydon’s equaliser came from a defensive mix up as a long clearance dropped over the defence’s heads but was not cleared by them nor Rebekah, and the Croydon striker scuffed the ball into the net.

With Elle and Elizabeth introduced CPLFC began to control the game better with an additional body up top and Elle was unlucky on 2 occaisions not to score, the first a rasping shot which was defected wide and a second purposely curled shot after beating 3 players agonisingly hitting the bar/post and the half finished 1-1 with Croydon on the ropes for the most part.

Rebeeca was unlucky towards the end of the half to not get her second of the game screwing a shot wide and also contested a series of 1-1 with the Croydon keeper who did well to keep them in the game and Rebecca had to go off injured after a nasty collision to be replaced with India who immediately caused panic in the Croydon defence with her speed.

The second half began with Croydon again pressurising well when not in possession of the ball, and hitting hopeful long balls and were incredibly lucky to get a second goal when a hopeful shot squirmed through Rebekha’s hands and into the goal and for the next 10 minutes Croydon had the lion’s share of the game. Rick reacted by introducing Mia Q, pushing Lucy into midfield and Shola into centre of defence and slowly but surely the game begun to turn in CPLFC favour, resulting in Rebecca hammering in another thunderbolt from a similar position after good work from Maya, Lucy and Elle.

With Mia L identified as a real threat to Croydon she came under a fair amount of physical treatment and the game descended into a series of free kicks as Mia L, Lucy and Shola taking on the physical challenge of Croydon, who did show much intention to play the decent football that we have seen in prior encounters with them and Mia L responded in the best possible way by scoring a superb individual goal having cut in from the right to fire in off the post ! 3-2 with 5 mins to go ....

With Hannah W off with a nosebleed after taking a ball in the face, Elizabeth filled in at left back and Hannah McW back on, CPLFC were dominating the game as Croydon’s heads dropped and the third of a series of corners saw the fourth goal scored be Elle, calmly using her knee to Latch onto Hannah’s excellent delivery.

With the game won CPLFC were content to allow Croydon’s long balls to run out and the game finished with handshakes and praise for both teams from both sets of supporters.

Well done girls, you remain unbeaten, and with Wimbledon drawing with Abbey Rangers, and now top the league

Next up .. double header with Teddington