Chelmsford & Mid Essex 5-0 Barking & Dagenham
THE FIRST SILVERWARE OF the district season went to Chelmsford & Mid Essex as they secured the Essex Schools’ FA Girls’ League title with a dominant win over Barking & Dagenham at Shenfield High School. The visitors arrived knowing victory would capture the inaugural championship for themselves, but a strong showing from the hosts – from the first whistle to last – meant that the destination of the winners’ medals was never really in doubt.
Just two minutes were on the clock when Barking & Dagenham failed to clear their lines from an early corner and the home side pounced to convert inside the penalty area.
And the second came in similar fashion on the stroke of half-time when a loose ball from a defensive position provided the opportunity for Chelmsford to double their lead – an opportunity which was duly taken.
Glimpses
In between, Barking & Dagenham defended the edge of their penalty area stoutly, offering glimpses of their own threat without ever really convincing.
Their best moment came on twenty-seven minutes when Jasmine Amrane’s through-ball split open the Mid Essex back-line, sending top-scorer Tolu Elufowoju off and running in behind.
Taking the ball in her stride, she spotted the advancing keeper off her line and imaginatively attempted an audacious lob from the edge of the box. On the heavy surface however, the necessary lift proved elusive as the captain’s effort was grabbed by the grateful hands of the home stopper in what proved pivotal moment, just seconds before the hosts’ second goal.
Promising
After the interval, Barking & Dagenham showed renewed defiance, winning their midfield battles and fashioning a sequence of half-chances, the most promising of which saw Amelia Hussain’s right-wing cross almost fall for Elufowoju inside the six-yard box.
A third goal for Chelmsford & Mid Essex two-thirds of the way through the game though was decisive and put the game beyond doubt.
Resistance
There remained pockets of resistance from the visitors.
Rusne Rimkeviciute was in no mood to yield ground as she tied up the left side of the Barking & Dagenham rearguard with fierce pride.
And Atene Skendelis – who scrapped and scurried throughout – picked out the simlarly impressive Jaydee Williams in space on the left flank. The tricky winger then picked out Elufowoju who cut inside for Barking & Dagenham’s second effort on target of the match. Again though, the home keeper clutched the ball out of the air at the last second to deny Barking & Dagenham a consolation.
It was Skendelis again who came closest in the final stages, volleying the goalkeeper’s dropkick back over her head from forty yards only for the attempt to drift narrowly wide.
By then though, Chelmsford & Mid Essex had added two more for their fifth straight win in the competition and a total of twenty-six goals with just two conceded.
It is a record that could not be matched by any of the teams in the competition, although Barking & Dagenham will take solace from coming the closest as they finished in a creditable second.
Barking & Dagenham: Ajewole (George Carey), Adjoh-Davoh (George Carey), Skendelis (Godwin), Williams (Goresbrook), Arhin (Northbury), Hossain (Northbury), Hussain (Richard Alibon) Petrauskaite (Richard Alibon), Elufowoju (Rush Green), Stoute (Rush Green), Rimkeviciute (William Bellamy), Amrane (Gascoigne), Ameny (Valence)