A team effort

After a weekend break everyone was eager to get back on that pitch with friends around. We gathered in the changing rooms to get a 10min briefing of everyone’s life, and time to ensure we all checked the Beatrix Potter Collection of 50p coins. Farrah admitted she paid £1 for a 50p and Laura was google-ing her brothers 50p to see if she had another £1000 coming her way! It was more of a shock to everyone that Fi had paid all her match fees and was now in credit!
It wasn’t just the hockey that was getting us excited… we were anticipating the arrival of hockey royalty. The one and only Carol Marshall was rocking up as the match official. Thank you, Carol, it was great to see you!

Despite Hannah’s best efforts to bring down Team D, with the Wilson hand foot and mouth lurgy, Bazi still made it in body maybe not with all of her mind. The only one we were without, was our captain! Wrong priorities of hen do weekends in the hockey season saw her miss this weekend, but she had passed on all her wise words, tactics, paper work and first aid kits so we knew what we had to do.

After being very official, Rach (I’ve got a hamstring injury) and Carol (Hockey Queen) soon realised they didn’t enjoy the TD duty that much as they had to stay impartial and therefore couldn’t shout for Newcastle throughout the whole game. We are all here to play and have fun but apparently most of all we are here to look after each other. When Kenya made a passing comment about her runny nose it was Hannah who helpfully providing her with a tissue in the huddle.

Different from other games, Amy had to do something from the very beginning of the match as the Uni pushed us to gain a short corner. Amy stayed big and moved well in the goal to deny Uni any chance of scoring. We absorbed the pressure well in the first half and began to build our game. Julia ran the wing and we continued the amazing communication that we had been doing, “pass Julia, pass, pass, pass!” Julia carried on running and running and found herself in the D. At which point she passed the ball to Audery who then scored! 1-0!

We ran together and for each other, we talked to each other to know where we all should be. We didn’t stop running. We made every tackle as an individual for each other on that pitch. Fi was tackling and tracking back so much, that she even carried on without her stick after she dropped it in a tackle. Continuing with great communication Kenya asked Audery to step left or right… every time Audrey had to check on her hands to see which was left and which was right.

We made it hard for them to play and when we got the ball we created opportunities for each other and finished them well. Our momentum only grew in the second half regardless of the extreme wind. Kenya was always first to the ball high up the pitch which created more opportunities for Bobi, Julia and Megan. Helen had one in the D which she skied high and it unfortunately didn’t drop in time to sneak in under the crossbar. I mean it might have just about come down before it reached her house just around the corner.

Hannah and Bazi seemed to do a bit of a freaky Friday situation this Saturday, with Bazi constantly falling over and Hannah become very angry indeed! Bazi stopped the ball at the top of the d, only to do the next movement and fall on her bottom. Towards the end of the second half of the game Hannah’s patience had ran out. The constant swearing from the opposition and moaning forced Hannah’s inner teacher to come out! “JUST STOP IT!”

As tempers began to rise we still pushed them to get more goals out of the game. The defenced worked hard to get the ball out of the back up to the forward line. You have to watch these forwards. During all of this hard work, Megan just had a causal chat with Brian on the half way line, and then turned just in time to receive the ball. Again, everyone was shouting her! Another forward with a law to themselves is Princess Bobilina! Fi tricked the defender and left the ball to go through to Bobi. Only for Bobi to just carry on running off the pitch to be subbed ignoring the perfect pass! But it was the last goal by the forward line that caused the most controversy. A beautiful shot by Audrey towards goal. It was going just inside of the left-hand post. This goal was to be Audrey’s hat trick goal. It was until Megan popped her stick in a deflected the ball at the very last minute into another area of the net. Audrey didn’t score the goal or even make her hat trick, but Megan did score another to leave it a tie at 2 goals each in the MuHOOOOOOOOlian family.

The final whistle came and we had made it 4-0 against the uni! A job well done by all. We might have won the game however we definitely lost at teas. Fi only just remembered to do them after Bobi text her the night before about the gluten option. Teas improved with the handing over of the ‘Banana’ to Bazi, without actually handing it over as Hannah’s young boys had pulled it too hard too many times and split the Banana all over her carpet. A little shout out to another hockey royalty of Mother B who umpired very well even though she suffering from an injury at present. We wish her a speedy recovery and we can’t wait to have you back.

As Timo Cruz from Coach Carter stated “We are all meant to shine as children do. It’s not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own lights shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.” With every pass, every run, every tackle and every shout on the pitch we made each other shine on Saturday.