Snow had now cleared

The snow had now cleared and we could resume the fixtures – much to the relief of the squad who were eagerly awaiting the chance to burn off some of those added Christmas calories!  First match back was against Tameside, the first time this season we had encountered this opposition and it couldn’t have gotten off to a much better start.  A goal within the first four minutes, a nice strike from Jennifer Worth put Stockport in front and stunned Tameside.
 
The Stockport attack were on a rampage, lovely flowing passing between forwards Lucy Cook and Lisa Hornbury put constant pressure on the Tameside goal keeper who was pulling out saves from left, right and centre.  Times when Tameside did attack were easily managed by Kelly Shore, who game has come on leaps and bounds.  Kelly, together with Wendy van Tonder and Lucy Rowbottom in the centre of the midfield were able to construct the play from the back, leading to the scoring of Stockport’s second goal.  A sweet strike from Lucy R from the top of the Tameside D, went straight in and nearly broke a hole in the back board.
 
Stockport were cruising at two-nil up but let their concentration slip for a brief moment, conceding a penalty corner from which Tameside scored, although not through a direct strike, they got the ball in the back of the net on their second attempt.  With the score now at 2-1, Stockport continued to dominate the attack and went on to increase their lead again with another wonder strike from Jennifer W.  The ball looped into the top right hand corner and Stockport were 3-1 to the good.
 
The first half was action packed and Tameside were not lying down easily, they scored approximately 5 minutes before half time with a goal mouth scramble in open play.  Stockport went into half time with a one goal advantage; all geared up for a battle in the second half to get 2010 off to a winning start.
 
It was pretty much the same story in the second half.  Stockport dominated the attack with Rachel Dunley, Emma Woodhead and Lisa H combining well together to put pressure on the Tameside defence.  The Tameside goalkeeper was pulling off some great saves to keep the score as it was at half time and it was end to end stuff with attacks from both teams, keeping the mid field for both teams busy.  Natalie Sutherland was having a stormer putting in lots of tackles and giving the Stockport forwards lots of passes to keep the attack strong.
 
This amounting pressure allowed Stockport to increase their lead to 4-2 with a hat-trick goal from Jen W, thanks to some persistent attacking play down the left hand side from Claire Atherton and Lisa Hughes, who combined well together to allow Jen to score past the Tameside keeper.  At this point you would think the game would be wrapped up but five minutes from the end of the game, Tameside scored to make the score 4-3 and make the last 5 a very tense time for the Stockport team and supporters.
 
Despite a last minute penalty corner for Tameside, Angela Fuggle kept her concentration during the last vital minutes of the game and pulled off a number of saves during this section of play and also throughout the whole of the game and last section of the half.  Tameside were at their most dangerous during this time but Stockport were to hang on and get their first win of the year and keep them nicely positioned in mid table.
 
POM - Natalie Sutherland