USW Women’s hockey 1sts captain Femke Reinders praises her side as they fall to a narrow 2-1 defeat to Cardiff University 3rds.
Reinders was keen to stress the improvements that USW 1sts had made since their 6-1 thrashing in the return fixture. The midfielder highlighted USW’s teamwork as a key reason why they were able to take Cardiff University right down to the wire in this afternoons clash at the USW Sport Park in Treforest.
“Since Christmas we’ve started playing more like a team” she said, when asked about her thoughts on the encounter. “Everything has been so much more positive, we don’t mind that we lost, we just want to get better and we have definitely done that since the last time we played them” Reinders stressed as she stressed that performance was much more important to the team than results.
When Reinders was questioned about what specifically has changed for USW to have such a dramatic increase in performance she heaped praise onto the freshers in her squad. “We had a lot of freshers this year and its been a big step up from school hockey to women’s university hockey but they have become more physical and feisty on the ball”.
Finally, Reinders looked forward to their two remaining games of the season and what lies in store for this young university side. “We’ve got two games left and we’ll have some things to look on and it will be good to finish on a high” she replied. “I’ll be leaving USW next year but for the girls still here it will just be about doing the same thing, keeping the same mindset and continuing to improve”.
USW 1sts will play Cardiff Met 2nds at the Sport Park next week before making travelling over the Severn Bridge to take on Bristol University 3rds in their final game of the 2019/20 BUCS Western 2, Division 2. USW will be looking to avoid a season whitewash as they sit bottom of the league on 0 points heading into the last two rounds.
Haydn Evans 