Nick Berry once sang “Every Loser Wins”, it makes no sense but I’m keen to see L5s and winners in the same sentence so…

Winning Winners… M1, M2, L3s (not just in the quiz), M4s, L4s
Drawing Winners… L1s
Losing Winners… L2s, M3s, M5s, L5s

This week’s special mention goes to the Ladies 4s who sent Jo Dutta off to Newcastle with their first win of the season. Well done ladies.

More details of who did what, when and where below.

Ladies 1s

Waltham Forest Ladies 1st team took on Brentwood at home with both teams having to battle the elements from the first whistle. Forest started well with some great linking play around the pitch and some early shots on goal. However, having been caught on the break Forest went down 1-0 when Brentwood converted a short corner. The home side fought back well for the remainder of the match and with perseverance and determination their hard work paid off: with 10 minutes remaining Man of the Match Elizabeth Evans scored a well-worked goal, dibbling to the byline and out manoeuvring the Brentwood keeper to get Forest back level at 1-1. Next Forest travel to Thurrock on March 1st after the half term break.

Ladies 2s

Amazing play from the ladies 2s today against top of the league, Southend & benfleet. We had some good chances and were looking pretty dangerous early on. They also had some good breakthroughs though, and got a solid goal in the first half. Not to worry; we kept our heads high, and the strangest short corner goal, from a combined Phil and suzy effort, saw us drawing 1-1. Unfortunately my cry of “we’re going to win this” riled the oppo enough for them to step up their game, and they scored another. Our composure and determination almost got us a draw. We were still happy with our performance though, even with a 2-1 loss. Let’s keep this going for our final matches ladies!

Ladies 3s

Ladies 3s triumphed without a goalie! 7-0 against Upminster! Cassie got her hat trick, Jane Kendall also scored a hat trick but had one disallowed, and Kareen got 2! An amazing game ladies!

Ladies 4s

Woo hoo, we WON, yes, we won, first win of the season. Ladies 4’s won 1-0 against Havering with a great goal from Sophie.

Ladies 5s

Ladies 5s were their resilient, determined, committed selves today and physically ended up at the mercy of Loughts. Couple of goals that perhaps we should’ve got in, couple of sloppy errors (find me a team without those!) but defending was epic today. Countless attempts on goal were superbly defended, who cares how many went in! We won the moral victory by a long way.

Gemma, Jo, Leonie and Keisha with LOM match nominations but Michelle won the trophy…it was my honour to present it to her in traditional fashion!

The Ladies 5s ‘my bruise is better than yours’ competition now begins in earnest! Photo entries by Monday please latest! If you’ve got a broken bone, you win.

Men’s 1s

Missing a number of key players, Forest played hosts to Bishops Stortford on Saturday, a team that surprised them earlier in the season when they lost 3-1. Forest started strongly and were awarded an early Penalty Flick that Nico Kurt confidently converted. Forest continued to move the ball around with sharp attacking play despite a very compact and hard working performance from Bishops Stortford. It was the visitors however who equalised from a Penalty Corner halfway through the first half and it was 1-1 at the break.

Forest responded well after the break and some fantastic counter attacking hockey saw James Price beat two defenders before playing a delightful ball across the d to find Rich Lowe who calmly slotted in beyond the on coming keeper. To their credit Bishops Stortford worked hard to pressurise the home side, but were unable to create any clear cut chances. Chris Drewe sealed the win after some unselfish play from Phil Peacock who might have scored himself; Final score 3-1.

Men’s 2s

Smashed 6 past Chelmsford on their sodden water based.
Tom Lowe even got on the score sheet for the first time – I knew bringing him up for shorts would pay off eventually.
The other goals came from Imran Arshad, Alec Zetter and on OG from one of their players.
We didn’t have time for democracy, so it’s martial law and I’m givingJonathan Jones POP for missing two open goals.

Men’s 4s

Another Saturday, another stupid o’clock PB time, this week 10am. The only saving grace being, we only had to travel to local rivals Redbridge and Ilford HC, to play their Academy side, on their newly laid hybrid Astro.
The reverse fixture was a very feisty affair, as was today’s game.

The 4th of our 6 cup finals, in pursuit of promotion and becoming champions. Again for the umpteenth week on the spin, we were quickly out of the blocks, playing well and creating opportunities, which we spurned to start with. Although we were unlikely to get punished for missed opportunities, as the oppo were not making inroads into our solid defensive base.
Finally for us on the day, and for himself this season Jon Sidwell opened the scoring, ceasing on a rebound, and finishing in style, his first goal of the season. From that moment on the result was never in doubt, we absolutely dominated the game, creating numerous opportunities, with Frank getting his what is now becoming his customary Goal, to make it 2-0, followed soon after by a 3rd from Mark Fisher. Just before the break, Jon Got his 2nd of the game, his goals were becoming like buses, wait ages for one then, two of them turn up together. 4-0 at HT, and it really was a case of keep playing the way we were, keep focused and it would simply be how many were we going to win by.

2nd half, again we played some very nice hockey, and when we were called upon to defend, which was not often, we were solid. We created a plethora of chances, but again some poor finishing, meant we only added another 2 goals, scored by Mark and Frank. 6-0 final score, thoroughly deserved win, having played very well, in a game that could have been a potential banana skin.

So 4 down 2 to go. Another bonus today, was that another of our promotion rivals (Old Loughts) dropped points meaning, if we win one of our remaining 2 games, we are guaranteed promotion. Still need to win both games to become Champions. Next up Wapping at The Academy, probably the title decider, massive game.

Onwards and upwards, 2 more top draw performances required, to attain our goal. Still lots of hockey to be played this season. No game next weekend, so try to attend training, keep yourselves fit and focused, in preparation for, what promises to be a very exciting end to our season.

Men’s 5s

The Mens 5s had a disappointing 2-0 defeat at Saffron Walden on Saturday in our last away match of the season. With the usual enforced changes to the team due to player unavailability we took a while to settle and conceded a couple of soft goals early on.

As the match progressed we had the better of the exchanges in a fairly even game, putting in great effort in blustery conditions to the final whistle, and, despite the game being punctuated by frequent stoppages, threatened the opposition goal on numerous occasions, hitting the post twice and having several near misses.