Brighton station. The 18:13 to Southampton Central. Confused commuters look on as the train slowly turns red and black. The beers are open, someone’s brought a vuvuzela type thing and Joe M has made a special T-shirt expressing his love for Paula Howells. It must be a cup final, writes Mike Wallis.
Chunky has been here since mid-afternoon and has spent the afternoon sampling the takeaways of Lancing. There’s no decent beer in the bar (I’m told). And does anyone know if Albion’s reserves are any good? They beat Worthing 3-1 in the last round, but we’re not sure how good Worthing are either.
The setting sun makes it hard to tell what’s going on for the first 15 minutes or so for the decent number of Rooks that have congregated behind the goal. It’s clear that Brighton are the better technical football team, very happy playing passes around between themselves, but rarely if ever threaten Emily Moore’s goal for the whole match.
It’s Lewes who create all the chances, often by brute forcing their way through the Brighton midfield. Olivia Carpenter was sent clean through and scored but the goal was chalked off for offside. Lily Murray, the Brighton keeper for the first half, looked very nervy throughout and very nearly provided an assist to Paula Howells by hitting a clearance straight up in the air, Howells went for the lob but the ball was implausibly cleared off the line by the Brighton defender Jess Pegram. Howells and Carpenter were almost off celebrating.
The second half continued where the first had left off, with Brighton slowly coming back into the match but never really creating a serious attempt on goal. Indeed, the closest they got was when a shot was blocked by one of their own players. How Lewes didn’t take the lead late on in the second half I still don’t know. First, Katie Gilligan set Howells through on goal, Howells squared the ball to Leah Lane who had an open goal to aim at but Rhianna Fowler tracking back somehow got to the ball first and deflected it wide.
Second, a free kick was half cleared, Hannah Godfrey shielded the ball and allowed Gilligan to have a shot from the edge of the area, only for the Brighton second-half keeper Marshall-Miranda to pull off a superb fingertip save, pushing the ball onto the bar. Kayla Ginger was first to the rebound, which came to her at an awkward height but with an open goal to aim at and her header came back off the bar as well and somehow evaded the lurking Carpenter. Brighton defended brilliantly throughout, it just felt like it wasn’t going to be our day.
Lewes probably edged the 90 minutes, but a penalty shoot-out doesn’t care who was the better team. Hannah Godfrey waved furiously at the Rooks fans behind the wrong goal to change ends. Howells had scored the first by the time I’d made it to the other end. Clarabella Hall had been brought back on (presumably) specifically to take a penalty and as so often when this happens, the shot ended up in the car park.
Carpenter hits the next one into the top corner. Olivia Johnson does the same. Kayla Ginger hits a near perfect penalty low and off the inside of the post. Director Joe and I confuse each other about what the score is. May Balmer sits Moore down and hits the penalty down the middle. Maddie Brant hits hers low into the corner. Some quick maths. If Brighton miss, Lewes win. Jess Pegram, who had made the outrageous goalline clearance from the same goal earlier on, stepped up, and smashes her penalty into the Lewes-U13s behind the goal. Emily Moore looks at the referee. Brighton have missed. Lewes win.
This was the final act of what has been a really enjoyable season, despite both sides sitting solidly in mid-table. The men’s side will have yet another rebuild with a new head coach next season, but I’d hope most of the women’s side we’ll see again next year, where they’ll have both a trophy to defend and an unbeaten home record stretching all the way back to August last year. It’s never dull with Lewes.
Lewes: Moore, Brant, Schreimaier, Godfrey, Proctor, Carpenter, Howells, Connolly-Brame, Harvey, Roche, Gilligan. Rolling subs: Glass-Oliver, Ginger, Fatuga-Dada, Bacon, Lane.
Albion: Murray, Gay, Hall, Martin, Milner, Heron, Atinaro, Pegram, Balmer, Jones, Johnson. Rolling subs: Gaunt, Hester, Guest, Marshall-Miranda, Fowler.
Player of the match: Maddie Brant was superb down the left side all game and scored an excellent penalty in the shoot-out.
Video highlights here on the Lewes FC Supporters Facebook page