Ran out of legs and lungs.

Ipswich Ladies 1s faced the unknown London team of Teddington, arguably the oldest hockey club in the world…

The first quarter was very busy. Ipswich knew the game plan and found their groove very quickly. Ipswich making small unit play between Emma Logan, Taylor Ball and Georgia Harrold a short corner was won. A fantastically executed shot from Captain Lucy Dunnett put Ipswich ahead at 6 minutes. 1-0. 6 minutes later, Teddington find a goal to equalise. 2 minutes later, Teddington sneak another through at a penalty corner. 2-1. 2 minutes later… Ipswich win their second penalty corner… and execute another well drilled corner; this time from Lizzy Wheelhouse finding the backboard. 2-2. An exciting first quarter over!

Second quarter welcomed more goals to the match on both sides. Ipswich scoring another penalty corner from the powerful Lucy Dunnett. 3-2 up. Teddington weren’t letting Ipswich get away with that lead for long… equalised 3 minutes later on penalty corners.

Half time comes around and Ipswich feeling good and in a very strong position. Moral high and game plan remains top priority. Ipswich kept the ball doing the work, passing was going well and players were staying calm under pressure, specifically POTM, Charlotte Satchwell. Unfortunately Teddington got the 7th goal of the game in half way through the third quarter. Ipswich were caught on the back foot and needed to regather to stay in contention of taking the 3 points.

Unfortunately a few forced errors in Ipswich’s defensive half took Teddington 5-3 ahead at 3/4 time. Ipswich needed to dig deep and find ways to penetrate their opposition’s circle in the final quarter. Final quarter, lungs started to struggle amongst the team and a few more errors started to emerge from mental fatigue. 3 minutes before the final whistle, Teddington countered on Ipswich error and took their final goal.

6-3 Teddington was the final score. Obviously not the result Ipswich wanted but the performance that they left on the pitch was brilliant. A very light squad and 2 debutants for the team; 13 year old and now the youngest NL player, Emilia Noordhuis and new member to IHC, Maddie Wagland. The girls built on last weeks grounding and have a strong foothold in their individual beliefs to score goals, deliver the game plan set and work hard for each other. Coach Mariette Rix couldn’t be prouder of the team’s positive performance. Stat from this weekend comes from the highest percentage of penalty corner attacks converted; 100% success rate in the first half.

Next weekend, Ladies 1s host top of the table Guildford; coming off the back of their first loss of the season... let's see what happens.