Sils slip into Gear

A new youthful Sils side took to the pitch against local rivals Warwick Ladies 2 in the opening Division 1 game of the season.
Sils were soon into their stride with the new players bedding in well and pressing the Warwick defence with determination. Within 7 minutes Sils had forced their first short corner which caused disarray in the Warwick defence before being scrambled away. On 15 minutes the ageless Ally Taft collected on the 25 and powerfully ran into the D before slotting the ball home for the first goal. This shook Warwick into a more counter attacking regime although their attacks faltered on the strong defensive wall that Sils had in place.
10 minutes later Sils found themselves 2:0 up as Taft seized on a defensive hesitation to power the ball home. By now Sils were in full swing and were completely dominating the game as Warwick retreated to pack the D although chances went begging there was no further score and the half time whistle allowed the team to regroup to go again.

On the restart Sils carried on from where they left off in pressing the Warwick players and forcing mistakes a short corner on 42 minutes was smashed in strongly by Kate Huntington and Naomi Ennis was the first to react to the rebound and cooly slid the ball home.
By now Tamar Majovedia and Tori Breillat were growing in confidence on their debuts and were not looking out of place while the strike force of Cooper and Ennis were starting to gel with passes being interchanged well, causing panic among the visitors packed defence. Numerous short corners were being forced but scrambled away by the tiring defence.

On 64 minutes Breillat stole the ball before slipping it to Taft who again fed Cooper who found the corner of the net to make it 4:0 to Sils. On 67 minutes Warwick made their first meaningful strike on goal but this was seen off by a combination of goalkeeper Joanne Brett and the ever reliable Caroline May.

Further attacks were launched on the Warwick goal and in the dying seconds May surged into the area with the expectation to complete a memorable return for her only to be thwarted by the Umpires whistle.

A good all round performance by the team and although stronger tests may come during the season this was a great base from which to start especially having a lost a number of experienced players during the close season.

Man of the Match: Joint award this week, Sam Cooper for seamlessly moving into her new role of Captain and leading by example throughout and Tori Breillat for an accomplished debut that looked as though she had played there for many a season.

Dick of the Day: Sam Cooper “So how long is a hockey game” don’t worry Sam we will put it down to stress!!