Newbury then played with a real sense of injustice and they showed fantastic team spirit, to take the game to Kingsclere. Both Maria Rodrigues and Kendall Gilmour having shots that were saved and blocked. Lorna Kinder-Parr then headed narrowly wide for Newbury. So whilst Newbury were looking good going forward, they also looked solid in defence, with both Saide Gulliver and Nicole Pearce playing superbly. Rodrigues too, was getting through a huge amount of work at both ends of the pitch, as she was in the right place to head one Kingsclere corner off the line. Gilmour showed some nice trickery just prior to half time, when she laid off a pass into the path of Rodrigues, but her edge of the area shot sailed just over the bar. With no Newbury equaliser found, Kingsclere were able to take their slender one nil advantage into the half time break.

Newbury started the second half strongly, but despite having the balance of the play, Kingsclere still looked dangerous on the break. From one attack, Kingsclere rattled the Newbury cross bar and the rebound was latched onto by Thain, who scored her second goal of the afternoon to give Kingsclere a two nil lead on 63 minutes. Newbury now had a bit of a mountain to climb, but they refused to give in and continued to battle well for the cause, but they were unable to find a way back into the contest. Kingsclere were measured in their play and they remained in control, sitting pretty with their two goal advantage. Then in stoppage time, Newbury conceded a free kick on the edge of the area for a handball against Gulliver. This again looked to be a very harsh decision by the Referee, but Kayleigh Cooper capitalised for Kingsclere, driving the ball home from the set play to give her side a three nil win.

It was a disappointing end for Newbury’s Development Team and the three nil score-line was particularly hard to take.

Match Report by Sue Hewett