Why no warm-up?
One tell tale sign of when you are going to see one team absolutely trounce another one is by looking at them in the warm-up. The team that is going to score a hat full of goals tends to be doing a good mixture of exercise and skills practice, where as the team that is on a hiding to nothing tends to half heartedly kick the ball around.
The reason that I have made this observation is that on Sunday I went to Cambridge Women V Norwich City Women in the South East Combination. It was the second game that I have seen Cambridge Women play and despite the heat yesterday, on neither occasion have either of the teams been out on the pitch warming up. Yesterday the first half hour was some of the most lacklustre football that I have seen and neither of the teams looked like they were ready to play.
Finally on 34 minutes something happened when a Norwich player was left unmarked and they took the lead. Cambridge then also woke up and on 40 minutes should have put the ball in an open net, but shot wide. On 44 minutes Cambridge were equal when the centre forward sprung the offside trap ran onto a through ball and scored to make the half time score 1-1.
The second half finally looked like a game of football and I don't think that it was only the beers that were making it seem more exciting.
Cambridge got half to a great start and the centre forward scored a carbon copy of the goal she had scored just before half time.
On 58 minutes Norwich got an equaliser when they were awarded a penalty after a foul in the box.
The rest of the game was played out with more conviction, but clear chances were few and far between. It looked like it was going to end a draw, which probably would have been a fair result, but with time clicking on the clock Norwich pushed for a winner. In stoppage time they managed to squeeze the ball under the keeper and the Canaries had a 3-2 win.
Picture from the corner in the first half:
Picture from behind the Norwich goal in the second half.
The reason that I have made this observation is that on Sunday I went to Cambridge Women V Norwich City Women in the South East Combination. It was the second game that I have seen Cambridge Women play and despite the heat yesterday, on neither occasion have either of the teams been out on the pitch warming up. Yesterday the first half hour was some of the most lacklustre football that I have seen and neither of the teams looked like they were ready to play.
Finally on 34 minutes something happened when a Norwich player was left unmarked and they took the lead. Cambridge then also woke up and on 40 minutes should have put the ball in an open net, but shot wide. On 44 minutes Cambridge were equal when the centre forward sprung the offside trap ran onto a through ball and scored to make the half time score 1-1.
The second half finally looked like a game of football and I don't think that it was only the beers that were making it seem more exciting.
Cambridge got half to a great start and the centre forward scored a carbon copy of the goal she had scored just before half time.
On 58 minutes Norwich got an equaliser when they were awarded a penalty after a foul in the box.
The rest of the game was played out with more conviction, but clear chances were few and far between. It looked like it was going to end a draw, which probably would have been a fair result, but with time clicking on the clock Norwich pushed for a winner. In stoppage time they managed to squeeze the ball under the keeper and the Canaries had a 3-2 win.
Picture from the corner in the first half:
Picture from behind the Norwich goal in the second half.
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