Derby County Ladies

Derby County Ladies faced another blank weekend with their opponents Loughborough involved in the Leics County Cup, and the Reserves game away to Crewe then fell victim to the freezing weather conditions.

The u16 Centre of Excellence game was also in doubt but after a 30 minute delay Derby kicked off down the slope looking to gain the upper hand. The breakthrough came after 10 minutes when Kelly Bishop crossed from the left and Cara Newton nipped in front of the goalkeeper to give Derby the lead. Goalkeeper Maisie Skinner pulled off an outstanding save to keep Derby in the lead but then a defence splitting pass allowed the Kidderminster striker to run through to level the score. A moment of quality came 10 minutes before halftime when Sophie Digva picked up the ball in midfield and split the Kidderminster defence with a lovely diagonal pass. This found Amy Pashley who fired home from the corner of the penalty area. In the second half the girls upped their work rate and never gave Kidderminster time to settle on the ball. Derby increased their lead when Sinead Morgan won the ball in defence and sent over a difficult ball for the Kidderminster defence to deal with. Cara Newton was onto it in a flash and shrugged aside the defender before rounding the goalkeeper and slotting the ball into an empty net.

Derby continued to be the better side with the defence of Jess Sippits, Sinead Morgan, Kerry Brentnall and Lindsey Sisson thwarting any attack the visitors threw at them. The score stayed the same thanks to a fantastic late save from keeper Emily Atkinson. The second half was arguably the girls’ best performance of the season as they worked very hard for each other and defended from the front as each and every player contributed to the success.

The u14 development side thumped 16 past Pegasus to claim their place in the next round of the cup, and the u12 7-a-side team also triumphed in the cup, beating Southwell United by a 3-0 margin. Beth Wager netted her second goal in as many games, with Rebecca Montague converting two good passing moves into goals.