Milan

8 in the morning at Liverpool, the trailer packed with 10 boats, and 4 on top of the van, 4 of us set off on our way to Milan! Many hours later it was time for the tunnel and then over to France and the travel into Belgium and Luxembourg! A night in  the IBIS hotel then off into Switzerland and the beautiful alps, finally reaching Italy!! 

The remaining two players took the plane from Heathrow with the women in tow! Unfortunately due to exams we only had a team of six.

A quick training session with the women for some warm up games. Then off to tea (unfortunately the pizza was not as big as in Göttingen). Then off to bed.

A late start meant a nice lie in, and a leisurely breakfast in the hotel.

First game versus Germany! It was 0-0 at half time, but then we let the game slip away from us ending 3-1 with a goal from Farley from 8 metres out. 

A long break then France! Very much revenge game following the loss of the bronze medal at the Europeans, finishing 4-3 to us! A well fought game, with a chasing two and two pushing the French to force errors. A very well worked goal in the last minute put in the back of the net by Georgina!

Last game of the day was Italy which ended in a 9-5 win. A pushing two and two worked well, with some great stars run in attack! Unfortunately the liability of the team, Georgina Longbottom, nearly had a fight with an Italian and got a yellow card (with Farley celebrating that it wasn’t her getting the card for once!)

Sunday morning the first game was against Germany. A 3-1 win meant the score was reversed from the Saturday game, with a hatrick from Katie Farley. A more fluid attack and a tight defence kept us in the game.

Second game of the day was against France. This game was the a disappointing result ending in a 6-2 loss, with them breaking on us 4 times and scoring 2 from inside. Although disappointed in our play we kept our heads up for the Italian game. 

Italy was our final rematch of the group, a tighter match than we would have hoped for with us winning 4-3. Although the score was tight, we managed to learn a lot about how to hold the ball when the other team have press 5 on us. 

We thought this match had sealed us a place in a final, because France had drawn to Italy the day before 6-6. We were eating lunch when Brian asked why we weren’t warming up because we were suppose to be playing in 20 minutes. Very confused, we checked the scores and they had changed, with France in fact winning the game against Italy so beating us to the place in the final by goal difference. Although disappointed we jumped on the water to play the 3rd 4th playoff against Italy. 

A well fought game finishing 4-3 to us put us in 3rd place. Although our aim was to reach a final, we had many individual victories in the games, beating Germany for the first time and also France for the first time after euros. 

After loading up the trailer in the scorching heat, we watched the men’s final and then went to the prize giving ceremony. With it lashing down with rain we received our 3rd place trophy and then started the 4 hour trek to Switzerland. 

Our player of the weekend was Katie Farley. The way Katie plays is admirable, never a moment when she is not moving, her confidence to shoot from far out and her amazing chasing off the front are just some of the huge contribution to the team she brings. Without Farley’s positivity and brilliance we would not be the team we are today. #THEkatiefarley

Overall everyone played well, Amira doing a great job in defence getting the feisty Italians and the huge Germans out. Nicole making some brilliant saves in the French game in particular. Georgina  scoring a great goal in the French game to bring us the win. Caitlin playing well in the Italian game even scoring a goal for the first time in a while 😉 And Lucy Boyce our captain had a great weekend playing brilliantly off the front of defence getting lots of cheeky touches. 

We would love to thank Richard Fox for driving us and all the boats all the way from Cumbria to Milan! Without whom we would not been able to come to the competition at all.

Also a shoutout to Sarah Jane Longbottom for her coordination of the mum’s chat and Marcus Longbottom for flying all the way to Milan to support us! 

Coming back to the rain and cold of England but with our heads up ready to train hard ready for our training weekend and the next ECA Mechelen!