Belnorth Lightning Girls U14/2 Kanga Cup Journey
Coach John Williams sent in this report on how Belnorth Lightning girls took out the Cup.
The girls started the week without having trained together due to bad weather, so this was going to be a bit of a learning curve for all of us.
The first four games showed plenty of promise with the girls not winning but holding their own.
When it came to the quarter final against NSW Dolphins who we lost to 2-1 the previous day, I knew we could win with a few positional changes. The end result was a hard fought 1-0 victory.
In the afternoon we played a semi final against Brindabella, the girls went out hard and should have been 2-0 up in the first 15 minutes but we could not find the back of the net. Brindabella scored a break away goal 20 minutes in and held out until half time.
The second half was going the same as the first with Belnorth attacking but not able to find the equalizer, then Brindabella scored again against the run of play 2-0 down.
With just over 20 minutes remaining we won a penalty, but the Brindabella goal keeper saved it. To the girls credit and never say die attitude they threw everything at Brindabella.
We won a free kick 25 yards out and Jade fired it into the top left hand corner 2-1 game on. With 12 minutes left Liana scored the equalizer from 8 yards out and now the girls new they could win.
Final minute Madeline (Mady) ran down the right hand side of the box with the ball and with some of the girls yelling shoot she fired home the winner.
The final was against Braidwood who we had lost to 1-0 in our second game, so we new we could match them.
The game started with Braidwood doing most of the attacking and the girls trying to hit them on the break. This was not working and the girls were under a lot of pressure.
I made 4 positional changes and that seemed to work better as the girls where able to push out more. The first half was end to end with both teams having chances but at half time it was 0-0.
In the second half both teams looked more determined and came out harder but neither could break the deadlock. With 23 three minutes remaining Liana made one of her mazy runs with the ball and as she had done in the semi final she scored from 12 yards out.
We knew Braidwood had to attack even harder now and that we had a chance of hitting them on the break. The girls all rallied in defence as Braidwood came at us.
With injuries to Jade, Dani and Elise (our keeper) the girls did a remarkable job to keep Braidwood out. As time was running out we had a few half chances to seal the victory but Braidwood did most of the attacking but in the end the girls won in what has to be one of the best turnarounds ever.
Well done Dani and Stacey three straight plate wins, to Milly, Anne-Marie, Josephine, Shanly and Elise back to back wins.
To the girls for the first time Liana, Ali, Chloe, jade, Rosa, Mady and Frances.
Thankyou to Dave assistant coach/manager and Shane for assisting in finding girls from the under 13. Truly a great team effort well done
Cheers John Williams coach
p.s. From sunny Turner if we can win why cant the Aussies
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