(no subject)
Got a lift to Enfield with Leon and Pete for the Hawk girls' play-off semi-final with Norwich. Pete had looked on the FA website, which said the game was at the Queen Elizabeth athletics stadium, soon-to-be-home of Enfield Town FC, and so he'd printed off the AA route to go there. He should have looked at the She Kicks website instead, which correctly said the match was at Brimsdown Sports and Social Club, home of Enfield 1893.
So when we turned off the M25, we first shot all the way through Enfield and ended up in Edmonton. Leon turned into a side road for a quick U-turn, followed the signs for Brimsdown, and we ended up lost in a housing village. Three different young passers-by had no idea where Goldsdown Road was. I looked up Google Maps on my phone and identified the main road that it was off, Green Street. The next local we stopped knew where that was, and we arrived at the ground at 12.50 - still time for me to grab a can of Magners from the bar and an excellent burger from the serving hatch.
Lots of the girls asked me if I'd had a good time on Friday night. Sabrina and Kerrie sat in the front row of the stand; Kerrie got up more than once to say she was still in party mode, hum a Pogues tune and dance. Norwich had quite a few supporters, and the Enfield Town Ladies players were in the stand, not openly hostile to us but occasionally calling for one of our players to be sent off, or for Norwich to pull a goal back, "just to make it exciting". But there was also an Enfield Town fan there who was cheering us because the behaviour of the Norwich players radged him off when they played Enfield in the league this season.
Any Hawk nerves were calmed when we scored two in the first ten minutes. Norwich got one back from a penalty just before the break after Sadie was judged to have brought down their striker (at half-time a local told me that he'd been stood behind the goal and the Norwich forward jumped over Sadie, missing her entirely, then went down). Their supporters bayed for a red card, but the ref correctly gave Sadie only a yellow, as at the time of the "foul" Kim had tracked back to behind Sadie, and Laura was also coming across.
Becki made it 3-1 early in the second half with a beautiful looping 30-yarder, and the Hawk Ladies added two more without reply. The girls did a massive celebratory dance on the pitch after the final whistle. Back to the clubhouse for another Magners, but had to sink half of it pretty quick as Leon wanted to make an early getaway.
And so Gillingham await in the final...
So when we turned off the M25, we first shot all the way through Enfield and ended up in Edmonton. Leon turned into a side road for a quick U-turn, followed the signs for Brimsdown, and we ended up lost in a housing village. Three different young passers-by had no idea where Goldsdown Road was. I looked up Google Maps on my phone and identified the main road that it was off, Green Street. The next local we stopped knew where that was, and we arrived at the ground at 12.50 - still time for me to grab a can of Magners from the bar and an excellent burger from the serving hatch.
Lots of the girls asked me if I'd had a good time on Friday night. Sabrina and Kerrie sat in the front row of the stand; Kerrie got up more than once to say she was still in party mode, hum a Pogues tune and dance. Norwich had quite a few supporters, and the Enfield Town Ladies players were in the stand, not openly hostile to us but occasionally calling for one of our players to be sent off, or for Norwich to pull a goal back, "just to make it exciting". But there was also an Enfield Town fan there who was cheering us because the behaviour of the Norwich players radged him off when they played Enfield in the league this season.
Any Hawk nerves were calmed when we scored two in the first ten minutes. Norwich got one back from a penalty just before the break after Sadie was judged to have brought down their striker (at half-time a local told me that he'd been stood behind the goal and the Norwich forward jumped over Sadie, missing her entirely, then went down). Their supporters bayed for a red card, but the ref correctly gave Sadie only a yellow, as at the time of the "foul" Kim had tracked back to behind Sadie, and Laura was also coming across.
Becki made it 3-1 early in the second half with a beautiful looping 30-yarder, and the Hawk Ladies added two more without reply. The girls did a massive celebratory dance on the pitch after the final whistle. Back to the clubhouse for another Magners, but had to sink half of it pretty quick as Leon wanted to make an early getaway.
And so Gillingham await in the final...