Bolden's Blog
Bolden’s Blog: Drawing with Castle, wayward shooting and missing footballs
Published by Gillingham Ladies Media on October 29, 2009
OK, so lets start by taking a look at the game Sunday against Castle Colts. Not our finest hour (and thirty odd minutes) definitely sums up the game. Gills started brightly with a few early runs seeing Chloe Phillips and Chloe Jamieson giving the right side of Castle’s defence a good work out. Against the run of play Castle went one up in the first quarter leaving a stunned Gills to pick up the pieces. From then on Gills looked like the struggling team, with a severe lack in complete passes, neat control and teamwork.
Charlotte Thurston hit a cracking volley only to be denied by the cross bar, and despite some hard work from the forwards, with strikers Kylie Overton and Chloe Phillips, the score remained one- nil at half time. Seans team talk reminded the girls that at half time it was only a scoreline and not a result, and encouraged us to pick up the pace. A surprise substitution of Terri Reynolds saw Rachel Ahern back in the centre of the Gills defence.
Second half saw much more of the game in the middle in compared to the end to end game in the first half, with both teams making runs and seeing them turned away. Annelle Massey came on to replace Leanne Stevens, and Gemma Ridge moved onto the wing to allow Kirsty Goodall to push forward with Kylie Overtons debut ending to make way for this change, after a yellow card for dissent. Kirsty Goodall made a great chance from a Chloe Jaimeson cross, but was unlucky to put the ball wide. Chloe Jaimeson became the hero of the day as she hit a well timed shot into the top corner.
The Gills really picked up in the last ten, with shots firing in from all angles as the girls had renewed heart. Chloe Phillips was unlucky not to put the Gills ahead with a well timed run, but all in all the Gills did not really deserve to get more than a point from the game. This was reflected with the teams attitude after the game with a brief team talk from Sean and a quiet walk back to the changing rooms.
Gills picked up at training this week with 6 aside being completely re-ordered so that “team naughty” were completely split to stop the recent cheating evolving. Not quite so eventful in comparison to the usual antics, but none the less exciting with the usual mixed up positioning and wayward shooting. Thursday took a new form with much of the first team away, the reserves took over the training ground and started the session with a rather shadowy match leading to a fairly low pace game.
With the girls looking to do some shooting, a few of us defensive types retired to the corner to do something a little more controlled. It was during this that we began to discuss a session I had completed in the daytime at a soccer school and the girls expressed their enthusiasm to try it. The rules were simple, when you’ve taken your first-time shot from a fed ball, you run into the goal and defend the next shot. If you score the goalkeeper at the time is out and waits for the round to finish. Well, simple you would have thought!
We started with right foot only, first time shot, which proved quite successful after the girls started to remember to run into the goal, leaving most of them out on their first shot for forgetting to defend the next player’s attempt. As we moved onto left foot only the game started to liven up, with some rather great slices and flailing ballerina legs and a number of wimpy goalkeepers.
To increase the challenge, as if we needed any more, the girls volunteered a number of rules, one was left foot only, right foot only volleys, two touch etc. Left foot only volleys simply became a source of amusement as many of us looked like we belonged in the circus rather than on a footie pitch.
Jess Nunn, our famous foot-in-mouth keeper offered a further source of amusement, as she was the only player to suss that if you run and catch the serve before the player shooting gets to it, you can never be out! So proud of you Jess!! Right foot volleys lead to almost all of the balls ending up over the fence, leaving a few of the more nimble players climbing fences, getting stuck in random places, to retrieve them all. It was only when we made it to the end of the session just about in one piece, we realised there was an open gate at the end of the pitch! DOH!
No little munchkin action this week, although they did us proud last Wednesday with a comfortable win over Soccer Elite, another development centre who regularly play us in training with many mixed results.
I did however still enjoy the rude awakening of a 6:30am alarm as Matt and I headed to Basingstoke for an FA Academy in-house training day for under ten and twelve coaches. Despite the pouring rain we both learned a few new sessions and got to gossip with other coaches about sessions, who gets given the most kit and the best night spots in Brighton in light of our Brighton away game next week!
This sadly lead to me missing the Charlton- Gills game at Priestfield this week, as I didn’t make it home in time after sitting for hours on the M3 – just what a girl wants to do on a wet and cold Saturday. I had to make do with watching my Dad run the line at Lordswood for the thirds with regular text updates from the girls who made the game. Not quite as much drama, but some interesting play and some much more colourful challenges.
I have been working at soccer schools all week where we look after the kids for five hours a day for five days, where they experience skills and drills in the morning, and tournaments in the afternoon. I managed to turn up on the first morning without any footballs, which created a rather amusing headache saved by the good thinking of a fellow coach who had luckily brought a spare set – I’m sure it’s about time that they made a three day weekend!
But quote of the week has to be from a six-year-old child who asked me in the middle of a game “who is the corner to?” Oh bless!
Gills reserves face Crockenhill at home this week, so lets hope with my shooting masterclass we can start burying some more goals this time. Good luck to the firsts too, and a special hello to Whitney Judd who bullied me into mentioning her!