The Team

League Match
SUN 28 JAN, 2pm	Bolton Wanderers Reserves	0	v	4	Manchester Stingers

Scorers
Nicola Armstrong 1, 68, 72
Aisha 82

Player of the Match
Nicola Armstrong

- Musical accompaniment for this week's match report

Match Report
Greetings Stingers, where do I start? After two weeks of frantically scouring round the country checking out the academic talent and with my brain completely fried,  I am back to write the match report. (So apologies in advance for the mediocre standard.) This week’s game was away to Bolton Wanderers Reserves, and the Old Trafford crew got off to a bad start by turning up late, due to a confusion the previous evening in Essential, when we thought the clocks had gone back during “Put your hands up for Detroit”. After a cold as ice stare from the Gaffer, and one lost bumble bee on the M60, we arrived at Darcy Lever in good spirits.
 
We were lucky to have the refereeing talent Collina in charge of the match, even though his kick off whistle was barely heard in the blustering conditions. Stingers were goal hungry from the off and the first chance was created in the opening seconds when Armstrong passed to Jinny who shot at the keeper. The keeper spilled and Armstrong poached from 2 yards out. 1-0 Stingers.
 
The conditions were appalling but this did not seem to significantly affect the standard of play, with the tackles going in thick and fast. The football was a somewhat scrappy affair, with the ball constantly going out for throw ins. Stingers had a dozen chances, half a dozen of which just went wide. The score remained one nil as the ref blew for half time.
 
After a very brief team talk by Harris due to the conditions, Wanderers kicked off. The conditions remained dreadful and the subs were frozen through after standing like soldiers. The ball continued to ping pong over the two halves with few chances created. However the stalemate was broken when a Stingers through ball was latched onto by Armstrong, who took a touch then shot into the top left, and despite getting her fingertips to it, the keeper could not prevent the second goal. 2-0 Stingers.
 
Stingers remained to dominate possession, and this seemed to frustrate Wanderers. The dominance paid off when a through pass by Scouse landed at the feet of Armstrong who shot into the top right from 20 yards out, a hat-trick for the new striker. The Weatherspoons Eggs Benedict had obviously paid off. The next three to six minutes saw three subs with Aisha, Max and Gwen coming on. Irish Nic continued laying off good passes and Aisha proved she was no chicken by getting straight into the game and scoring within 5 mins. Talk about supersub! The dying minutes were scrambled, with the ball going in all directions but Stingers were delighted to keep a clean sheet as the ref blew for full time. And not a moment too soon; the heavy pitch meant we were completely beat. Well done Stingers, Six points from Wanderers this season, we can’t ask for much more than that.
 
Effort of the Match: Armstrong for her peach of a hat trick. If it wasn’t for the high IQ and her C cups, I’d swear she was Eve.
 
Idiot of the Match: Karen for going ballistic at our time keeping when we were the first to arrive at Bolton!
 
Tune in next week for Katie Fingers effort, to the tune of  "I got a brand new combine harvester" (Translation available on request).

Maxine Bell