Sports Insider by Gerren Scapens

University of South Wales Women’s rugby coach Mark Hutton ‘pleased’ with performance despite 39-20 loss to Cardiff Met 2s.

USW hosted Met at the sport park on Wednesday afternoon for what would be their final home game of the season.

The game got off to a bright start for USW after key influences from Georgia Evans and Megan Webb. Despite this the game didn’t head their way after two yellow cards almost in succession made the game hard to come back for USW.

Despite this, Head Coach Mark Hutton had this to say with his views on the performance. “Yeah I was quite pleased. You know it was an improvement on last week particularly, but recognising the players we had away. You know that was a depleted squad last week got away with 14, but today the effort was their.”

Later on in the game two of his own players got yellow carded and he had this to say on the topic, “Obviously two consecutive yellow cards down to 13 players and that was the turning point you know, unfortunately. We could question that some weren’t the best of decisions but we know still that we just need to get on with the game.”

As not being able to look to the near future as much Coach Hutton spoke about what the whole team could work on towards the future. “Recognising that we are losing a few players, third year students. Things will obviously change, but from today we are fortunate that we had the game film today. So we’ll take a bit of time to look just to look at specifics, rather than working on one thing in previous times, we can look back at all game film and work on much more.”

Then just before I ran out of time with him Coach Hutton gave a few shoutouts to the squad members, “You know, obviously acknowledging that we had Megan Webb and Georgia Evans representing university today and done particularly well, you know, complimented and uplifted the team. But you know to recognise our captain Keely Ward, very inspirational on the field and with our forwards play, always positive and inspirational to others.”

The team will take these words and have some time to rest as they travel to Bath in two weeks.

USW Women’s Lacrosse Team fought back in strong second half performance against Cardiff Met. (10/10/19)

After a fourth quarter hat-trick from Hannah Westhenry USW fell short at the end of a tense second half with the game having ended 12-8 to Cardiff Met.

It started promisingly for USW in the third quarter as momentum had completely swung after half time. Thankfully for Cardiff met goalie Charlotte Cox had managed to stop numerous attacks on their goal.

Just before the end of the third quarter Cardiff Met scored twice in quick succession through vice-captain Chloe Sloman and captain Megan Bradbury in the 13th and 14th minute.

The fourth quarter was then when the momentum finally started to show back on the scoresheet with Hannah Westhenry assisting and scoring within the first two minutes of the quarter.

Unfortunately for USW there were two quick fire goals again by captain Megan Bradbury in the 51st and 54th minute that put the game out of reach.

This didn’t stop USWs efforts though as again Hannah Westhenry shone in the final five minutes of the game to assist one more and score twice more in the 55th and 56th minute to finish of the fourth quarter hat-trick. Despite their efforts towards the end USW’s efforts fell just short and Cardiff Met came away with the victory.

First Attempt at the Start of the Year at a Q&A with Hockey Captain Femke Reinders

Q – What do you think went well with todays game, in particular the second half?

A – ‘In the second half we played a lot better we were pushing a lot more. I think we just ned to work on that a little bit. It wasn’t the worst result it could’ve been a lot worse so I’m happy that we got a few goals in, the short corners went quite well. Yeah we are working more as a team which is quite good. It is only the second game in to be honest so we still have a lot of work to do. We’re getting there, it’s a lot better than last week so there is an improvement.’

Q – What improvements would you like to make coming in to the coming weeks?

A – ‘Communication is key. No more faffing around on the ball probably, quicker passes, just work more as a team. As we say it is getting better it is not quite there yet. Our coach is really helping us with what we did today. We can see that our coach is doing a good job. Again short corners are getting better, we did score one off a short corner which is brilliant.’

Match Report: A Superb Second Half Display From USW 1’s Earned Them 4-0 Victory Over Bristol 3s at the Sport Park.

The early exchanges of the game was very feisty with both teams leaving a mark on each other.

USW soon began to take control of the tie with an array of passing moves keeping Bristol pinned back towards their own goal.

The closet chance USW came to taking the lead in the first half was through Zack Cane. After some good passing play, Cane was played in to have a free shot at goal but his effort was smartly tipped over the goalkeeper.

Despite their dominance, USW could not capitalise on any of their chances with their killer instinct lacking.

Bristol remained strong in defence as they held out for the rest of the half with the scores even.

The second half was when USW became much more clinical with their control. In the 33rd minute and only the third of the half, captain Dominic Roberts took the lead to begin a dominant second half performance.

There was only another three minutes before Dominic Roberts doubled his tally as USW looked to kill the game off as quickly as possible, their aggressive intense high defence was paying off.

Throughout the rest of the third quarter USW gave Bristol no room as Bristol barely made it out of their own half once.

This pattern then continued during the early stages of the fourth quarter with USW solidifying their controlling dominant performance holding Bristol deep into their own half leaving the defence with next to nothing to do.

Dominic Roberts continued his outstanding performance with only four minutes left after netting the third for himself and for USW leaving Bristol bewildered on how to change their fortunes.

The performance did not die down in the closing minutes with Zack Cane again leading the charge on the high defence putting in some excellent tackles high up the pitch.

The day only got better for Dominic Roberts and the rest of his team as with only a single minute to go he added a fourth to his name and again USW’s to easily take a 4-0 victory.

The defence doing their job superbly as well as the attacking side as well putting in a great team performance.

Match Report: USW 5’s hold on to edge out Swansea 4’s

USW came out on top with a 3-2 win in a rollercoaster victory at the Sport Park on Wednesday afternoon.

The game started slowly for USW as they conceded a goal mouth scramble in the seventh minute which ricocheted as four players kicked the ball at the same time.

As that goal was conceded USW woke up and started to play much better. Not even a minute after conceding USW were on the front foot but then striker Jonas Eze was taken out horrifically after beating the keeper to ball just outside the box which drew a lengthy stoppage.

The next ten minutes was filled with pressure from USW. This was followed by an exceptional piece of team play as keeper Tom Ogg took a goal kick short to his centre back and five passes later Vishnu Dhanapal played a beautifully weighted ball over the top for Jonas Eze to slot away to bring the game level in the 19th minute.

Not six minutes later had USW turned the score around and taken the lead after a wonder goal from Dhanapal. The ball came out from a corner to the edge of the box in which Dhanapal originally took a left footed shot which was blocked. The ball then bounced up and then struck it at waist height from 25 yards directly into the top left corner.

The game calmed down after this until stoppage time when USW got a free kick in a hopeful position. The free kick was lofted in and again came down in a scramble. The ball then dropped towards the back post in which wing-back Calvin Okeke managed to strike the ball with his weak foot and on the turn straight into the bottom corner to score what would eventually be the winner.

The second half ended up being a much more conservative half. USW set up from the start with five at the back so they could control the game as they had a more comfortable lead.

This carried on throughout the second half with very brief counter attempts from USW that never lead to anything. One slip up in the 86th minute gave away a free kick to Swansea which they capitalised again from a goal mouth scramble with only three people striking the ball at the same time on this occasion.

The pressure then built in the dying minutes with keeper Tom Ogg making a great double save to keep the lead and end the game to keep the 3-2 lead intact.

“Silly mistakes” cost USW 3s in 42-16 loss to University of West England 4s says player of the match George Ellams

The game started off relatively close in the first and second quarters with the score gap never being too far out of reach.

This changed in the second half as the scoreboard started to snowball out of USWs favour.

Player of the match George Ellams believes, “It’s just communication in the team, obviously it’s the first time we’ve played as a merge team of USW team 4s and thirds.”

With this in mind this is what was said on the new mixture of teams, “Overall we play quite well as a team. I think it’s just communication and training and practice that we need to put in to just refine some silly mistakes.”

Talking on her performance alone after getting player of the match, George had this to say, “It’s better than I have played in previous matches before, I feel there was a couple of small mistakes but they happen in every netball game, and yeah overall I feel like I played quite well.”

Despite the performance it was not enough to change the teams fate. The two teams merging will have two weeks of practice to try and perfect this new side as they play Aberystwyth 2s away.

USW 3rds Captain Katie Jones says “We knew it would be a tough game” in 48-9 defeat to Cardiff Medics

“We knew it would be a tough game” says USW Netball 3rds captain Katie Jones.

USW faced Cardiff Medics at the sport park in a 48-9 defeat in what was a strong defensive performance despite the end result.

The beginning of the game was much more of a close game after captain Katie Jones stated that, “Going into the game against Cardiff Medics we knew it would be a tough game however we aimed to keep our morale high.”

This showed early on as the Medics only held a narrow lead throughout the first quarter as the game plan was in good effect to not let the opposition run away with the game from the first whistle.

Later on despite the best defensive efforts the game plan started to fall apart and the opposition started to run away with it. Katie Jones had this to say, “Throughout the entire game our defence stayed strong to stop the ball getting down the court too quickly.”

It ended up being a disappointing game as everyone knew what needed to be done but just couldn’t get everybody working smoothly enough with each other to get the results the team wanted.

On top of this, captain Jones briefly mentions other points that the team need to work on in the near future. “After this game we will have to go away and improve on small silly errors that we are making such as our passing and intercepting.”

If the team practice well with each other after these few points hopefully the team can be heading back in the right direction.

Second Half M.R USW 2’s vs Winchester 3’s

The third quarter appeared to be much more of the same as the game was just as tight at the start of the half.

This took a turn as USW took advantage of having substitutes and keeping the teams energy as high as they could.

As the quarter wore on Sophie Donaldson took the spotlight putting separation between USW and Winchester as the away side started to tire.

The last ten minutes of the third quarter proved to be a vital turning point in the game as USW had managed to over double the lead they had at the half.

Despite the differential between the two sides both Beryl Okeyo and Olivia Steward put in a great last quarter performance to try and put their team within a chance at clawing the game back.

Unfortunately for the away side the damage had been done in the third quarter and was not recoverable. The last quarter was perfectly game managed by USW as the score stayed 11 goals apart as it had been at the end of the third.

After the game finished 46-37 USW can be happy with not an easy victory but a well-rounded performance in which the whole squad performed when needed.

Second Half M.R USW 4’s vs Aberystwyth

After the first half ended 2-13 both teams looked to take a much more clinical approach to the second half. To make their chances count.

Aberystwyth took a bigger foothold in the third quarter after Goal Attack Anna Clifton scored 8 of the 11 goals for Aberystwyth with a very impressive performance.

USW defended very well in the third quarter as Aberystwyth had many more chances than the goals they scored leaving the away side with a lot of missed opportunities.

The fourth quarter was when USW were at their strongest throughout the encounter. They impressed by doubling their score in the fourth quarter compared to the first three.

Despite their best efforts USW were unable to contain Aberystwyth as the combination of Anna Clifton, Charlotte Hanson and Ellie Hutchings scored over and over to build a lead with great individual performances.

In the end this result is USW fourths best defensive performance of the season so far and only one goal short of their best attacking display of the season so still many positives to work off of for the future.