Game 4 and we came flying out of the blocks, and within just one minute, the ball was in the back of the net! Liv got us off to the perfect start, putting us 1–0 up after just 60 seconds.

There was then a slightly confusing moment when the umpire warned “player 123” about nasty tackles. The only problem was that we don’t actually have a player wearing number 123!

A few minutes later, Ana was penalised for a tackle and was shown a green card. Ana quite reasonably asked why she hadn’t been warned about her stick tackles before receiving the card. The umpire said he had, he’d said 1, 2, 3 players and pointed at 3 (we still don’t know if it was us or opponents).

We continued to pile on the pressure, keeping Upminster firmly on the back foot. Then, in the 12th minute, Ali got herself on the scoresheet with the first of what would turn out to be four goals for her!

Ali then added another in the 17th minute, before Emma got on the scoresheet in the 19th minute. Ali completed her hat-trick shortly afterwards, giving us a very healthy lead and leaving Upminster with plenty to think about.

Just before the end of the first half, Ana had a few more words with the umpire and was shown a green card. Unfortunately, the conversation continued, and the green card was upgraded to yellow.

By half-time, we were firmly in control.

Half-time: 5–0.

The second half started in much the same way, with us continuing to apply plenty of pressure.

Within four minutes, Ali completed her fourth goal of the game — an excellent individual performance! ?

Just two minutes later, Ollie got herself on the scoresheet to make it 7–0.

We then had a little break from scoring while we continued to press and create chances. Near the end of the second half, Frankie took over, scoring twice in quick succession in the 64th and 66th minutes.

That brought the final score to:

Upminster 0–9 Old Loughts W5

Also a mention for the defence, despite the score, our defenders still had to work and they did so brilliantly.

Another excellent result, with plenty of goals, a strong team performance, another clean sheet from Champs and just enough umpiring confusion to keep things interesting!

Well done, everyone!