| Newbury where fielding a very new looking side with the Loss of 3 key players who have moved on to University. The whole of the left hand side of the team where gone and this was going to be a huge ask of the new players as Lewes are playing at a higher level of football. With this in mind Newbury played with a 4-5-1 formation to try and give some cover to the defence. The plan was to try to hold Lewes out and and try to catch them on the break. Kendal Gilmour was left to play the lone front man, and she did the job fantastically well and almost gave Newbury the lead with about 15 minutes on the clock. However Newbury where under a lot of pressure and this only made Lewes up their game. On 21 minutes the deadlock and Newbury's gameplan where broken. Some good work down the left ended with a square ball into the 18 yard box for a simple side tap in. Lewes kept up the pressure and a handball by Ami Blethyn gave away a free kick 25 yards from goal. This was crossed in and a well timed run ended with yet another simple tap in. The game continued in this vein up until the half time with Lewes creating and scoring chance after chance going in 5-0 to the good over a disorganized AFC Newbury.
The interval did wonders for Newbury and although the game was all but over they came out with a renewed passion. Newbury where taking the game to Lewes with some good passing and determined tackling. Then against the run of play Lewes scored from a long ball over the top. Newbury appealed loudly as the player seemed a long way offside but nothing given.
Lewes made a couple of substitutions at this point and they seemed to take their foot of the gas as the game was won. Newbury continued to press forward and Kendal got her rewards with a goal on 62 minutes taking the ball from midfield and holding off a number of strong challenges before calmly slotting the ball past the on rushing Keeper.
The game then went through a calm period with no goals scored for 20 minutes, with the help some excellent goal keeping from Chloe Hunt coming out the winner of 3 one on one situations.
Leanne Crease then managed to charge the ball down in midfield and as Lewes played the ball back from player to player she kept chasing until the ball was back with the keeper. A flustered keeper then played the ball into Leanne with the ball then heading out of play she managed to squeeze the ball into the net from the tightest of angles, and with that some pride restored to the Newbury Team.
In all, this was as much as Newbury could have hoped for and I am sure lessons where learned in defeat.
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