With strong words of encouragement bouncing around the clapping circle and the big stick HK...CC..shout out, we were hungry and ready for some proper hockey action.
The prosecco on ice and the guacamole and chips aplenty waited to greet our finish.
"Let’s play hard, have fun and win were Rob’s words to kickstart this match of all matches. Energies were high and within the first five minutes we were dominating.
Applying the lessons learned from Thursday’s drill, we looked on fire; switching the ball around the back, sending the ball into space, running to the baseline, all the ingredients were there for a goal, but alas it was not meant to be...yet.
We had our chances with plenty of short corners in our favour in the first half. KCC, although small in stature, were full of fight and thought hard. We were marked ladies; a very physical game which at times frustrated us, along with our interesting umpiring made for a very colourful day of cards and words.
At half time and a goal down..we knew we had a tough second half to contend with. With “let’s do this!” ringing in our heads, an air of even stronger fight pervaded the valley. Little did we know how eventful it was to be... Liv close to scoring with a storming run into the D, Stace so close to having that goal winning prosecco, Mari on fire, fighting for every ball on the wing, the ever solid Gill our goal saviour, Griz and Jano strong on defence, Rach and Bridge providing the love, stability and calm, Lisanne and Ais pushing the front line, joined by versatile Gen who can pick up (the ball that is..) from anywhere..
Finally a beautiful through ball from Kath met by Emma to lift and smash it in lifted our spirits. We were now 1-1, with minutes to spare.
We were fighting on the pitch. In the meantime and little did we know, Gen had her own fight. Spotting a thief with her bag, she drops her stick and glove during the second half, scales the 2.5m fence and manages to retrieve her belongings and still make it back before the whistle. A role model of grit and determination!
The growing numbers of theft at the Valley needs addressing and we only hope that the HK Police take these seriously. We want to play safe in a safe environment. Final score was 1-1. We thought hard. We played hard. We are HK..CC!