Gloucester 1 Buckingham 4

On Saturday, the squad travelled to Gloucester, which is always a tough place to go, for their next league fixture. Against a well organised and physical side, Buckingham started well and immediately put their hosts onto the back foot. Some good build up play led to Buckingham’s first penalty corner (which could easily have ben a penalty stroke), but it made little difference as Alex Naughalty fired the ball home to give Buckingham the lead after just nine minutes. Katrina Nicholson doubled the lead on fourteen minutes after some more fine interplay. Despite continuing to dominate both territory and possession for the remainder of the half, it was not until the final minute that Buckingham extended their lead further. Some fine exerted pressure high up the pitch led to a defensive turnover and Phoebe Richards fired the ball high into the net to make the half time score 3-0.
The ladies once again, started the second half well, retaining possession and building pressure. However, a defensive lapse allowed the home side a clear counter attack and despite the initial shot and penalty corner being saved, some very sloppy defending from the resulting sideline ball allowed the home side to pull a goal back from the very next phase. Gloucester making it 3-1 after forty three minutes, gave the home side hope and they pushed hard for a second. Buckingham defended well for the next ten minutes but were probably quite fortunate not to concede again in that period. On fifty eight minutes Player Of The Match Phoebe Richards made it 4-1 with a cheeky between the legs finish and this settled both the side and the contest. In the remaining twelve minutes Gloucester lost discipline and as a result, had a number of players temporarily suspended. In these periods Buckingham should really have capitalised and increased their margin of victory but they could not convert a number of good chances. However, the side were satisfied to come away from a historically tough fixture with a relatively convincing 4-1 win.