Petroc Division One

Dartmouth 1,

Dart Totnes 1

There’s something about this fixture that seems to bring out the best of both teams.

Last year Dart beat Dartmouth 4-0, then six weeks later Dartmouth went up to Dart’s home ground and beat them 2-0; funny old game, this hockey...

It’s a long time since Dartmouth put in a performance like that and they were unlucky not to come away with a win.

Dartmouth’s back three played out of their skins.

Darcey Wall, Hannah Pillar and Jamie Rendle Streeter played their way out of defence and supplied the mid with some mouth-watering passes.

Ellie Malley was pretty much redundant in both halves of the game.

Sam Webb, Sarah Barrett, Lauren Rogers and Alicia Wadeson played with consummate ease in the mid while Alix Vincent, Lucy Pillar and Freya Bradley ran their hearts out and were unlucky not to score more goals than they did.

Dartmouth were without key players Mandy Servan and Ellie Lang­man and they was sorely missed.

With the push-back under way, both teams were trying to suss each other out and in the ninth minute Dart scored first with a breakaway goal.

Dartmouth dusted themselves off and were unlucky five minutes later when Alicia Wadeson missed by a whisker on the far post.

Dartmouth started to turn the screw and were rewarded by an exquisite ball from Sarah Barrett to Lucy Pillar, Pillar swivelling her hips to hit the ball first time and bring the scores level with 23 minutes gone. Dart­mouth control­led the rest of the first half and didn’t want it to end.

When the second half got under way Dart­mouth’s link play was sublime.

With Darcey Wall, Alicia Wadeson and Alix Vincent on the left, Jamie Rendle-Streeter, Lauren Rogers and Freya Bradley on the right and Hannah Pillar, Sarah Barrett and Lucy Pillar breaking through the centre, it was a real treat for the loyal supporters.

Dartmouth kept the pressure on but Dart shored up their defence and parked the bus.

Sarah Barrett kept supplying the ball into the opposition’s D but the Dartmouth strike force couldn’t get past the stubborn defence.

Dart chucked everyone up for the last play of the match after a succession of penalty corners, but Ellie Malley wanted to get in on the brilliant displayand kept her goal clear.

With the full-time whistle blown Dartmouth would have liked another five minutes and another goal and with the amount of possession they would have deserved it, but it gave the team something to talk about when they went back to the Old Inn and were served some much-deserved sustenance by landlady Juliet Free­man and father John Tremlett.

Special thanks go to umpires Jo Rendle and Robin Baldwin, who gave the spectators a fantastic game of hockey with the advantage play. The game was sponsored by Chick from the Frying Pan.

Player of the match went to Darcey Wall and spectators’ player of the match went to Hannah Pillar, but could have been given to all the Dartmouth players.

The girls will be out of league action for a while with an en­forced break, but coach Matt Putt will be looking at keeping the Dart­mouth ladies together and playing select XI’s throughout the Christ­mas break.