Harrogate Railway Ladies started their defence of the premiere league title with an emphatic win away to Pontefract.
In very windy conditions Railway dominated the whole match with Pontefract only getting 3 shots at goal, this was not down to Pontefract being a poor side just that Railway were determined to start the season with a statement of intent.
It was 20 minutes of hard pressure before the first goal came, when Pontefract got a shot at Rails Goal, Keeper Charlotte Donnelly was quick to do a drop shot towards Dee Swales(centre forward) who made a great run onto the bouncing ball into the Ponte half and as the keeper came out Dee lifted the ball over her head to score,0-1.
Railway were in complete control of the midd field with Rachel Dorkings, Rachel McDonald and Jodi Hodgson passing the ball out to all different positions and winning nearly every high ball .On the 40th minute Rachel Dorkings won a strong tackle looked up and found a pin point pass for Dee to run onto and strike a great goal from 18yrds out,0-2.
After the half time Railway applied the pressure again, centre back Issy Rowe collected the ball fed it out to left winger Sandra ’Sonic’ Clark who made a quick run down the line and did a great cross for Captain and right wing Ally Purvis to tap in at the far post,0-3.
On the 55th minute Right back, April Kennedy won a good tackle beat one more player and passed down the line to Ally Purvis who crossed into Jodi who in turn struck a lovely shot into the top corner, 0-4.
Katie Kennedy came on for Rachel McDonald and produced some fine football work, and made some crunching tackles and fine passes. After 65 minutes it was player of the match, centre back Jenny Hudleston who sent left back Emma Lansdall on a run down the left side who crossed in for Dee Swales to bag her 3rd, 0-5.
Cathrine Swinn came on for Jenny with 15 minutes to go and did some good tackles not letting Pontefract past. Railway were passing the ball around with great confidence winning 4 corners in ten minutes, after 78minutes it should have been 0-6 when Ally Purvis delivered a great cross which landed at Sonics feet 3yrds from the line only to put the ball over the bar!!! (apparently it bobbled in front of her) Not put of by this miss hap Sandra worked hard and 2 minutes later set up Jodi to score her second and make it 0-6.
With 2 minutes on the clock Ally put in a fine corner where Issy sliced the ball back across goal where Emma Landsall stuck her boot out and claimed the 7th goal.
A truly great performance from Railway and with loosing there top goal scorer to Leeds United it has showed that the other girls are queuing up for the golden boot award already. Next Sunday the Ladies are at home against Ossett Town at Station View 1-30KO.
