Dockers cling on for vital three points

Newhaven Ladies 3 Steyning Town Women 2, London & South East Women’s Football League Division 1 South, Match #10

Following two trips to Kent in the past two weeks, Newhaven were back on home (artificial) turf this afternoon, entertaining fellow Sussex side Steyning in a LSEWFL Division 1 South match.

Like the Dockers, Steyning have endured something of a mixed start to the season. Having picked up seven points from their opening seven games, they went into the game knowing a win would move them level on points with their hosts, and with a couple of games in hand.

This was undoubtedly a game that both sides will have had designs on winning.

With Newhaven manager Andy Cook serving a stadium ban following a dismissal in a cup match away at Brentford a few weeks ago (seems a tad excessive, but there you have it), it was left to Martin McLaughlan to be the voice in the dug-out. Something I’m sure he will have relished!

Shorn of their influential gaffa, you could have been forgiven for thinking that it might take the Dockers a while to get going.

That wasn’t the case at all.

After a relatively quiet opening ten minutes, with both sides feeling each other out without creating too much in the way of goalmouth action, the Dockers took the lead from the game’s first meaningful attack.

Docker’s striker Chloe Evans and Steyning’s goalkeeper Rebecca Smallman seemed to indulge in their own private shooting-and-saving drill, only for Evans to eventually force the ball over the line at (roughly) the 26th attempt.

It didn’t take the suddenly rampant Dockers long to double their advantage. 

While Steyning’s keeper could count herself highly unfortunate on the first goal, she certainly should have done better for the second. After being too slow to come off her line, her attempted clearance smashed into Docker’s skipper Lauren Smith, who then reacted quickest to the situation to race onto the loose ball and tap it in into the gaping goal.

Two-up and Newhaven seemed to be cruising. Steyning were rocking, struggling to create any real opportunities.

However, to the visitor’s credit they did begin to settle. Newhaven’s early dominance slowly started to cede. A nasty looking injury to Steph Harrison (hopefully not as bad as first feared), certainly seemed to knock some of the flow out of Newhaven’s game.

However, as is so often the case, it was while Steyning were enjoying their best spell of the game that the Dockers scored what was to prove to be the game’s decisive goal.

A simple ball over the top caused panic in the Steyning defence. Smallman was again slow off her line, and Lucy Collinson capitalised superbly, lofting the ball over the stranded keeper before racing round her and tapping the ball into the net.

Game over.

Or so you would have been forgiven for thinking.

Right on the stroke of half-time, from out of nowhere, Steyning were handed a way back into the game courtesy of a tidy Tabby Burrows finish.

Game back on.

The opening exchanges of the second-half were end-to-end, with both sides creating decent chances to score. Lauren Smith’s pace was causing constant problems for Steyning down the left, while the visitor’s direct style was putting Newhaven's backline – superbly marshalled by Charlotte Markham who was a rock throughout – under far more pressure than they’d been under in the first-half.

For me, the game’s turning point came on the hour-mark, when Collinson was taken off with a slight injury. Newhaven’s assistant coach had been running the midfield and her absence was felt almost immediately.

Within moments, Steyning had reduced the arrears to one, scoring a similar goal to Newhaven’s third. A long ball split the Docker’s defence and Abby Chriss raced through before brilliantly lobbing Annie Hills, who was stranded too far from her line.

Game very much back on.

Suddenly, Steyning were in the ascendancy. Newhaven were having to rely on every ounce of game management they possessed (much to the audible frustration of the visiting fans) to ensure they kept their noses in front.

Smith had a chance to put the game to bed with 20 minutes left, only to see her effort well saved by Smallman, but the Dockers were becoming increasingly less of an attacking threat.

With time running out, the hosts had been fairly successful in keeping their opponents at arm’s length, limiting them to mainly long-range shots, a few of which flew into the skate park behind the goal.

This was to change in the final ten-minutes when Steyning spurned a host of presentable opportunities to grab the point their second-half performance (especially the last half-an-hour) arguably deserved.

Hills twice did well to race from her area and put in two well-timed last-ditch tackles. Markham was throwing herself in the way of anything that moved. Mainly, though, it was some poor finishing that helped to preserve Newhaven’s slender advantage.

When the ref’s whistle blew to bring the game to its conclusion, Newhaven had just about managed to cling on to a vital three points. 

It was a huge result for the Dockers, though, whose fast start gave them something to defend - and defend they most certainly did! 

The hard-fought three points leaves them comfortably positioned in mid-table.

I’m sure when Cook gets to watch the video of the game back, he’ll be more than proud of the way his team battled in his absence to hold-on for the victory. I’m also fairly sure that McLaughlan will have finished the match with a few more grey hairs than he had prior to the start of the game!

The Sussex derbies continue to come thick and fast over the next few weeks. The Dockers visit Eastbourne United and Montpellier Villa in their next two games (on 20^th November and 4^th December respectively) before a home game against Bexhill United on the 11th December. 

That will be their final match of 2022 and it would be great to get as many people to Fort Road as possible to cheer on the women hopefully ending the year on a high.

Come On You Dockers!

My player of the match (aka, the controversial part): Charlotte Markham. An absolute rock at the back for Newhaven, who stood tall in the face of near constant Steyning pressure in the later stages of the game. Lucy Collinson was also very good until she was forced from the field.