Sophie Huyton-Taylor reports: "In a competitive clash at Brighton's home turf, the women's first team started strong against Holcombe, displaying energy and composure. The home side’s early pressure earned them a short corner, with a well executed set piece seeing the ball slipped left to Sophie, whose sweep was deflected into the goal by Renee to open the scoring.

The rest of the first half was evenly contested, with both teams battling hard for control. However, the composure dwindled in the second half, influenced by some contentious umpiring decisions, and a quick word was had with coach Ryan on the sidelines. A glorious stick tackle led to a green card for Aoife while Ellie also saw green for a distance, but effort remained high.

Holcombe capitalised on the shift in momentum, scoring twice from defensive penalty corners to take the lead. Brighton responded with an aggressive press, with tireless efforts by Bara in midfield, but Holcombe's counter-attacks proved effective, as they added a third goal to secure a 3-1 victory.

MoM : Bara
DoD: Sophie."

Worthing 1s 0
BHHC 3s 2

Alex Smart reports: "There were reports of daylight robbery at Angmering School as BHHC W3s swept in and stole three points from Worthing 1s. With the highest scoring game in the league so far under their belt, we knew that Worthing would be a strong side and they dominated most of the game.

We didn’t connect as well as in the past three matches and countless balls were turned over. Thankfully, Abbie had had her Weetabix on the party train from Hove and denied Worthing anything in the D. She even managed to keep her shoulder in place after it popped out at training on Wednesday. If I was Worthing, I’d be doing a whip round and telling Abbie she’d won a free holiday the weekend of the return leg.

Kudos to the defensive line too for cleaning up a lot of mess. Diva pulled out all of her best tackles for her old home crowd gathered on the terrace behind the pitch. Lizzy’s interceptions and outletting were super calm and she was a barrier at Abbie’s side for some successful PCD. Sumi distributed brilliantly from the left hand side with some cheeky danger runs and Amanda’s reach, despite being sleep deprived, seemed to get even longer this week. Gemma was on hand to win one v ones that came her way and linked up well with the screens to clear the ball.

It was surprising that we managed to defend all of the penalty corners so well when Diva left the masks in her car and the defence had to borrow a set from Worthing Men’s 1s. Thankfully we weren’t penalised for time wasting as Amanda had to have her mask attached for her each time.

We finally managed to turn the tide with some decent attacking play. Ellen, Emily and Izzy worked hard in screen as pivots to move the ball for speedy midfielders Ange and Elise to pick up. Shelley, Jo and Mirriam managed to lose their tight markers to get the ball into the D but Worthing packed it out with little space to get towards the goal.

Mirriam was so hungry for the ball, she rugby tackled a player for it. I did have a very nice shot from the left (if I do say so myself) which was very clearly on target as it hit a defender in the stomach where she was standing directly between me and the goal. Sadly, not even a corner was given. Shelley managed to get right on the keeper’s pads to rebound the ball into the goal and finally, we took the lead.

As the heavens opened in the second half, Worthing continued to dominate but the defence continued to deny them any reward for their hard work. With five minutes to go, we stepped things up and played some lovely hockey to keep the ball at the right end of the pitch. After some cracking efforts to score by Jo and Mirriam, it was Shelley who converted with a great finish after some strong passing into the D with just seconds left on the clock.

Not only did we steal the game, we then ate all of their burgers and sausages at the BBQ. I’m not sure what time the party train back to Brighton returned, or how Sumi got on at Angmering when she’d bought a return to Worthing.

PoM: 4th Shelley, 3rd Diva and Abbie, 2nd Lizzy, 1st Sumi

DoD: No votes needed (despite Jo forgetting essential items of clothing for post match)…
Diva (running onto the pitch for the match to start): “The masks are in my car.”
Rich: “Where are your car keys, I’ll grab them.”
Diva: “My car isn’t in Worthing.”

Other results

BHHC 2s 1 Horsham 2s 2
BHHC 4s 4 Middleton 1s 1
South Downs 1s 1 BHHC 5s 2
BHHC 6s 2 Mid Sussex 2s 1
BHHC 7s 1 Burgess Hill 3s 3
Southwick 2s 4 BHHC 8s 0