The Women's 3s Saturday game started eventfully on at 5am in the morning with the on pitch captain messaging into the group to say she wouldn't be able to play as she was currently in hospital - a rare encounter with nuts put me there! To my surprise at 5:30am Tucker picked up the message - honestly who is up that early on a Saturday? To my surprise she wasn't the only one (you know who you are!)?! The days events unfolded from there.

We had Anna Ross-Bell not realising that the central line was down so couldn't get to the car share pick up point (believe it or not, she didn't win DoD for this). Lucie Hatley came to the rescue with her excellent driving and navigation skills. Anna jumped on a train to Chelmsford station and Lucie and the car share gang picked her up and just made it in time for push back - there was lots of 'where are you?' in the team chat. Lucie was as cool as cucumber as always and knew they would make it. Note there were clear instructions from Sam to be fully kitted up by the time they arrived - it's pretty hard to put shin pads on when you are driving!

In the meantime, the rest of the team were gathering at Chelmer Park. Sam had her first misdemeanour of the day and went into the wrong changing room despite her regular carer, Molly, informing her it was the wrong changing room! She tried to join another team.

We were also receiving regular updates from Daisy who was on DofE with her head torch and massive rucksack - not playing - but still giving us updates. Claire asked the usual question of 'is it skins weather?' and Tucker asked 'is there cake?'. This is an insight into a regular Saturday morning for the W3s - focus team, focus!! You will get your rewards after the game!

So what happened in the game? From what I could gauge from Whipps X hospital A&E department, it was a scrappy and well fought game where we came out on top. Ella Baldwin netted the ball in the 29 min of the first half to take us into the lead at half time. Chelmsford fought back and got a goal back at 40mins. I believe this may have been aided by Sam Gayler - Emily's voice note gave that piece of information away! Then Lara Williams scored 2 more goals with both assists by Keira Keogh in the 50th and 60th minute to make the final score 3-1 to Old Loughts. That's 3 wins out of 3 games for the W3s and puts us on equal points with Brentwood at the top of the league but Brentwood have 2 goals in hand on us. This weekend we face Witham at home which will be another tough game but hopefully we will come out on top. As coach Claire said ' this is a marathon and not a sprint'. I know she has done a half marathon but not sure she has done a marathon before - they can be painful! Onwards and upwards everyone.

Woman of the week - this was shared between Lara and Molly for some really good play by both of them.
DoD - this went to Sam for her changing room antics and an 'own' goal - apparently it was a great finish.