By Maaike Toonen
It was not exactly a nice morning when the ladies had to gather for this week's match against the Roosbeek ladies, who, incidentally we beat 4-1 at home on the previous occasion. The sky looked a bit grey and the weather prospects were not promising. But that couldn't stop the ladies, who had already endured much worse weather conditions.
After two losses (but, note this: two great moral victories, though!) in a row, we were eager to put down a satisfying result, and for desert we had the prospect of coach's birthday party to look forward to!
This weeks ladies starters were: Franci, Jackie, Rachael, Ramster, Tish, Erika, Caragh, Maaike, Amanda, Helen (Amos) and Ana.
Off we were then on our way to Roosbeek, the little bit of chit chat in the car turned to your humble correspondent, "What did you do last night, Maaike?" and I replied, "I went out for dinner and it was really, really good." So far so good. But then I did something which I definitely should not of done considering the twisted minds of my fellow players. I wanted to emphasise how good my food tasted the day before, so I said, "Then I put it into my mouth and I thought, mmmmm." And of course Claire said: "Oh, really Maaike, you put it into your mouth and went, 'MMMM'. So just to make everything clear here, I was NOT initiating a blow job, I was talking about FOOD! Anyway, I know for sure that some people would be very disappointed If I had not put this into the match report!
Fortunately our minds were set back to football when we arrived at Roosbeek, where we immediately noticed we were in the nice Flemish country side with accompanying smell.
The pitch in Roosbeek didn't look as green as you expect a football pitch to look, but then again we had seen worse. We were all set: Super keeper Franci in the goal; super defenders Jackie, Rachael, Ramster and Tish; super midfielders, Erika, Caragh, Maaike and Amanda in the middle; and then our super speedy strikers Ana and Helen up front.
In the dressing room (which was obviously made for people that were not fully grown yet. I hit my head against the roof of course) there was the usual pre-match preparations. Caragh thought it was maybe a good idea to use some doping to prepare us for the game, considering the side affects: Death, low voice, paralysis (I had just seen a shocking documentary about doping on the TV the other day), we came to the conclusion that this might not be such a good idea after all. That didn't stop Claire though... she said; "okay, no doping then, but maybe we could try to play a match on xtc, then we will play so happy..." Mmmm, maybe?
The referee didn't forget his kit this time, so nobody was worried that they had to lend their towel or shower gel to the ref afterwards. The ref looked really professional and it was one with whom we had never played before.
Meanwhile the wind started to blow quite heavily and being that the match ball was quite light it flew all over the pitch, which was not really in our favour considering the fact that our strong point is playing with one time touches on the ground!
First half:
I didn't remember who won the toss, but we started with the wind against us. The pitch was very heavy because of the mud and it just looked like we were having lead in our shoes. This was not exactly the case for the Roosbeek ladies who were quite quick on their feet, and beat us every time in getting towards the ball. They also managed to play high balls, not exactly our strong point. Therefore they managed to get us out of our own game quite easily...
As a result the first half could not exactly be described as beautiful one touch football, like we are used to playing. Instead, it was kicking the ball back and forth without creating any chances on both sides - not really football to be proud of. The only chances we created were a couple of runs from speedy Ana towards the goalie, but their goalie just managed to intercept every time.
Your reporter had a shooting chance of her own. As the ball came to her from a scramble at the end of the box, she should have kicked it really, really hard, but instead wanted to give it some direction and it just bounced against one of the Roosbeek ladies. We were not really creating many decent chances or putting on the pressure. There were none of the trademark long crosses from the side of Erika and Amanda this time and all of our passes ended up in the feet of the opponents or went off the pitch.
Claire was doing her best to change this situation, shouting from behind, "Come on British, on your toes, we look like we're asleep", but alas, no change. And this time also we couldn't blame the referee because he was whistling an absolutely perfect game.
So we went back to the dressing rooms at half time without a really positive feeling. Fortunately coach came to join us to give us one of his great pep talks. The main thing was that we should try to play our own game and not drag ourselves into the opponents game of giving high balls and running after them. We put some new blood into the game with Amos up in front (replacing Helen) and we went into the second half with a much more positive attitude.
Second half:
We started the second half quite strong. We weren't dragged into the high balls game of the opponent and managed to play a lot more our own game. Amanda and Erika came up strong from the left and right side and gave a couple of good crosses. Caragh finally had an opportunity to fire off one of her great shots. Ana was even quicker than in the first half and found herself with a one to one on the keeper. This time, unfortunately, the ball got intercepted. Then Claire gave a great pass, which cut right through the defence and gave Amos the possibility to run towards the goal, but unfortunately again the ball got intercepted. So in the second half piled on the pressure, but unfortunately no goal came. But at the same time, it has to be said that we were extremely fortunate to have our great goalie Franci, as she made some extraordinary saves that kept us in the game.
Meanwhile, on the sidelines, Rana and her husband joined our regular supporters, Al, Julie and Dora, to give us some extra support, which we could really use. Rana's husband's voice has an outrageously long reach, so that even if you were completely on the other side of the pitch, you still felt you were getting cheered at from only a meter's distance: "Oh, come onnnn... refereeee..... no way that that was offside!!"
In the end I think we can say that 0-0 was a fair result. If we all had been in great shape then we would have beaten them at least 3-0, but alas, "Het had niet zo mogen zijn." So, the best thing for us to do was to get this game out of our heads as soon as possible and focus and next week game. At least we had one point and that was more than we have had in three weeks. For next week it will have to be a little more of: "Come on Britishhhhh!"
Squad: Franci, Jackie, Rachael, Ramster, Tish, Erika, Caragh, Maaike, Amanda, Helen (Amos) and Ana.
Subs: Amos
Supporters: Al, Julie, Dora, Rana and her husband (can somebody tell me the name of this great supporter with outrageous voice?)
Goals: none
Man of the match:
First: Franci, Ramster and Jackie
Second: Maaike
Third: Ana and Amos
