22nd Jan: Y4 Girls' Inaugural Fixture vs. the BLUs

Many congratulations to the Y4 girls on their first competitive matches, played against the BLUs (Bristol Ladies Union) at Coombe Dingle last Saturday.

With only a few exceptions, the Y4 girls are new Foxes this year, so to play against such an established team was a tough challenge (BLU's Y4s are in their 2^nd season, and have played 6 competitive fixtures already this year).

It was a great turn-out from the girls on a cold morning - 15 eager players represents almost our entire squad, so very well done to the parents for remembering to not turn up at the Downs! We and the BLUs each split into 2 teams, so had 4 games in total.

It has been amazing to see the fantastic advances the girls have made since joining the Foxes, and Saturday demonstrated this even further. Although the Foxes started a little slowly, by the end they were fighting for every ball, defending like terriers, and being every bit as tenacious and canny as their proverbial namesakes in attack.

There were magnificent contributions from all of the team and the Foxes were rewarded with a couple of tremendous, pile-driving goals from Scarlett and Teya (also now our “long throw-in” expert). The posts were also shaved a couple of times with superb left-foot strikes from Ella, and further attacking support was provided by Grace, among others. Serious midfield battling and defensive efforts were seen from Anna, Amy, Lilica, Megan, Tabatha, Taryn, and Amelia (who somehow manages to maintain an impressive sense of fashion-consciousness even when tackling with laudable ferocity). Some truly stunning (and often brave) goalkeeping from the likes of Rhiannon, Luella and Ella, as well as committed and heroic defending from Holly and Madeline, kept the games really competitive.

A sneaky late goal robbed us of a deserved draw in the first game (finishing 2-1), and other results were 5-0, 5-1 and 4-0 against us, but the girls made the coaches very proud. We all had a good time, have all learned a great deal, and we will be back!

Thanks also to the many parents that came to support the Foxes - their enthusiastic (yet admirably sporting) encouragement was much appreciated.

Business as usual next Saturday: Downs at 10am – wrap up warm!

Y4 girls’ coaches: Michael Welbourne, Rob Wallis and Pete Life