06/10/24-
This morning Diamonds fought through a difficult match against a very slick Ryland team.

Starting with only 6 players, we pushed through with some great feeds and movement through the court. But, Ryland had a great start and took a strong lead.
Q2 saw us with a full team of players and we were able to put to use some of our set plays which aided our game. We also saw some great interceptions from defence and some fab work from both the centre court and attacking players. Despite this Ryland played relentlessly and managed to turn over some of our passes, assisting their score.

The game continued with a similar pattern and resulted in the score of 57-20 to Ryland, which unfortunately breaks our winning streak of 14 games in a row!!

We will continue the season with confidence and push through, hopefully gaining some more wins!
Well done Diamonds ♦️

Written by Chloe – Captain

The ankle curse continues to radiate through Queens as ankle injury #5 of the season tackles poor Frankie in q2 of Queens vs Redditch Opals 🥺

Running very thin on the ground, but thanks to our wonderful new players – Alicia, Katie, Millie and Lucy – Queens took to the court with less than half of our “core” team to take on Opals on a grey morning today.

Unfortunately, Opals took the win 30-11 in the end but not for lack of trying as our new ladies, plus Hayley and Imogen, fought on with just 6 players after Frankie’s injury. However, Queens leave with their heads held high as we didn’t let it dampen spirits and in true queens fashion, kept on till the very last second.

A huge shout out and thank you to everyone who came to help us out so that the match could still go ahead despite injuries and illness and massive well done to Lucy for getting the player of the match award! 🥰🖤👑

Soph xxx

Aces 43 – 40 BDR

An amazing “first” game back for Aces today, we managed to keep our cool and focus on ourselves rather than the opposition which helped get the win we deserved!

In the first quarter we hit the ground running, managing to get ahead 14-6. This head start helped us tremendously, giving us that little edge that kept us in the lead throughout. Our skilful interceptions and rebounds pushed us forward and raring to go for the second quarter.

Keeping positions the same we went into the second quarter which ended with a score of 24-21 to Aces. With BDR getting a lot more rebounds and successful shots in, it started getting quite close. Nevertheless our spectacular shooters Grace and Chloe continued working hard and keeping us in the lead.

In our third quarter we needed to make some changes to make sure we stayed ahead. Changing around positions and focussing more on bringing the ball up the court we started increasing the score gap again. Izzy, Rose, and Gemma beautifully worked the ball in the attacking third, running circles round the forceful defensive opposition.

Our last quarter was incredibly close with the final score of 43-40. Once again, keeping calm and focussing on positive game play definitely helped us against the not-so-positive opposition (to say the least!). We saw some amazing interceptions from Leah and Katie in the D who fought off the attackers with ease. Sarah came on with some fresh legs and gave us the extra little boost we needed to end the game.

An amazing first game with us for Rose who got captain’s player!
Having that head start from the get-go definitely allowed us to feel comfortable in our play and get us that win!

Written by Grace Connolly – Player

The game started off well with a strong start and us taking the lead. Unfortunately, Lorraine’s dodgy leg became too dodgy for her to continue to play. This was heartbreaking for both her and us so early into the game. With a slight rejig we set off again and luckily continued to take the lead.

Confidence got the better of us going into the second quarter and we all got the giggles finding our silly mistakes hilarious, which of course they were not… Lorraine on the sideline didn’t find it so funny. With a stern talking before going into the second half, we pulled ourselves together and found some structure again. Jodie stopped coming so far down the court and the rest of us moved out of each others way and, after closing the gap, we started to pull ahead again and worked really well. It must have been ok because Lorraine changed her tune and said we were a ‘dream to watch’ at the end of the game.

I won player of the match 💁🏼‍♀️ and the team did so well, it was a fun game, we all enjoyed ourselves (maybe too much as some point) and we got a great result. Well done everyone!

♣️ Clubs 56 – 42 Hotshots

Written by Ellie – Captain

Sundays game saw Hearts take a great win against Jaguar!!
❤️ 64 – 🐆 24

We started off strong while settling into the game making sure we took our time not to force passes into Molly in the D. The first quarter saw the Jaguar GK take a nasty fall which led to our opposition being down to 6 players. Following this, during our play we made a conscious effort not only look for our free player and continued to move the ball through court making use of all the channels.

The defensive trio were on fire again with many tips and picking up all loose balls where we could, later converting these to goals. In attack we had some great movement around the D bringing in some rotations between myself and Molly followed by great feeds from Kate, Eliza and Chiara!!

Player of the match was awarded to: Pippa Kelly , very well deserved !! Xx

It was a really enjoyable game, well played everyone!!! A massive thank you again to Chiara and Eliza who played up for us! You girls played amazing❤️

P.s the lucky yellow bibs made their first appearance of the season showing us how they got their name 😉 thanks again Louise Coombs 💛💛💛💛💛

Written by Olivia – GS/GA

Queens are running on a 100% success rate as we took to a very wet and slippery court to beat Ryland Rubies 32-12 👑 🥳

The morning was not looking bright as we arrived amid the downpours and a very threatening sky and player’s spirits were reflective of this, but we got our butts moving and picked ourselves up 🙌🏼

Defence was absolutely tip-top, as always, with Beth, Lucinda and Stacey who are our consistently strong and very reliable trio making intercept after intercept for the rest of the team to turnover 🔥

Centre court kept pushing on, even when the going got WET and there were a few calls for footwork, and loose passing and receiving where the ball was simply too slippy to grip, but by q2&3 we managed to reign it back in with some steady pace and reminding ourselves of the basics, and then we begun to fly again, thanks to Stacey, Amy, Gemma, Sophie, Antonia and Frankie who all had a go (even with many of us out of our first positions)! 🏃‍♀️💨

Shooting was unreal, with the hard work between the combinations of Frankie & Amy, and Gemma & Hayley really having paid off where are seeing great movement, great timing and great teamwork to get goal after goal (not to mention the accuracy and conversion of shots has gone sky-high in the last few months) 🚀

Player of the match was deservedly awarded to Gemma for taking on C for a quarter where others don’t dare, IMMACULATE shooting at GA, never ever tiring and always bringing a very valued laugh to the whole team, even in dire conditions 🌧️

Queens; your very happy cappy 🫡
Soph 🖤

Diamonds match report by player of the match, Mary

Match report: Diamonds 22/09/24

We played a close match against Redditch Pearls yesterday morning coming out on top with the score 36-33.

Q1 began well, we were adjusting to their type of play which wasn’t helped by the weather but we started off in the lead. Our passing started off strong with excellent catching. We were able work the ball into the attacking D starting off the great shooting from both Chloe and Katie with brilliant offers from outside the D from Eliza.

During Q2 the weather got worse with more showers, but everyone kept in good spirits so we were able to bring the score up especially with Edie joining us as GD. A great tactic from Chloe was played excellently, she would drive out when the ball was near the D in order to give Katie room to go under the post the receive a pass which really put pressure on the Pearl’s defenders. With some impressive interceptions at our defensive end, this was our best quarter.

Q3 unfortunately Redditch pearls were able to close the score gap as we slowed the pace down to ensure less risk of injury as the court was very slippy now. However, at the attacking end there was more use of bounce passing which really threw off those tall defenders allowing us to keep our lead.

Q4 Here we saw the score come to a draw 30-30, the pressure heightened. We were able to lock in with the short sharp passing and quick changes of direction to easily carry the ball into our attacking D bringing the game back. The passing around the D before sending into either Chloe or Katie was very effective here and allowed us to score 3 in a row.

Well, what a start to the Winter League for Alcester Queens! 👑

Although we all try to be positive beans, it’s fair to say we were all feeling a tad wobbly going into the game without some players, some players with dodgy ankles, some with rubbish colds & all of us having those first-match butterflies… we perhaps weren’t our most optimistic selves.

BUT WE’RE THE QUEENS 💪🏼🤣✨

And we came out on top… 34-19 🥳

The defence pushed hard to take advantage of the opposition’s errors (shoutout to Lucinda Granger, Beth & especially Jasmine for helping us out today), allowing us to feed back into the centre court and push into the attacking third, where Frankie Woods and Amy-Sue Widman worked tirelessly around that D. There were countless rebounds caught by the shooters, never ceasing to give up, their determination (and not forgetting Elaine’s ‘word of the day’, ‘LIFT!’) allowing us to take the win in each quarter. This would not have been possible without the consistently incredible effort put in by our excellent Captain & Centre, Sophie, rightly so winning her Player of the Match.

Shout out to Antonia, whose naughty ankle got the better of her, but who always puts in her absolute best – you better rest that ankle and be back next week girrrrl!

Another shout out to Imogen for her first ever match with Alcester Queens, who put in her absolute best and found her groove as the game progressed – well done lovely!

Bring on the rest of the season!
AWOOGA! 🥳🖤

So tragedy struck this morning after Suzanne’s appetite got the best of her and she came down with food poisoning 😬 this was after Jo had already broken her toe and told us the night before that she couldn’t play AND the Bennett’s also are wild camping in dirty underwear apparently meaning they were already out this week, so for a scary minute there we only had six players…

but amazingly, Jasmine from Queens saved the day and stayed after her game to play for us (thank you thank you thank you!) and honestly, it was a cracking game.

We started playing having turned over the opposition’s first centre pass and it just went up from there. Some of us were out of position – shout out to Emily who was fab as a WA, but you wouldn’t have been able to tell and we finished the first quarter 11 goals ahead.

To be honest, I was worried we might have slightly overexerted ourselves in the first quarter, and we wouldn’t have been able to maintain this lead throughout but it definitely gave us a good head start. As the game continued, we did manage to slow it down and the opposition had a really good second quarter. However, given our lead from earlier in the game, we were still 12 ahead going into the second half.

We kept our pace in the second half and Jodie and Jeanette were on fire with their shooting. We kept control well (Sarah’s feedback), had some great interceptions from Defence and only started making some silly sloppy mistakes towards the end but I think we knew it’s because we had it in the bag!

Jeanette won player which was thoroughly deserved, and she even escaped from wearing the new player’s hat which I can only assume Amelia has taken with her for the camping trip to Sweden! Well done Jeannette! And thank you again to Jasmine for playing a whole game for us as GD after playing a whole game for Queens – we literally couldn’t have done today or got this result without you!

Well done everyone!!!

♣️ 61 – 33 🐆

Match report- ♥️ vs Panthers 2

Hearts’ first match of the winter season, against Panthers 2, saw us missing a few key players, with Chloe, Chiara and Izzy very kindly agreeing to play up for us.

The first quarter started a bit slow with everyone getting used to playing out of position and with new players. We eventually found our ground and pulled the score back in the second quarter.
Liv and Chloe both had a great game at GS and GA, holding their own against a tough defence and scoring some excellent goals.

Izzy, Chiara and Kate rotated in centre court, giving some really strong feeds into the D and helping the defence bring the ball up the court.
Kat had a really strong game in WD against a very quick WA, but she was able to keep up, putting a lot of pressure on her and keeping the ball out of the defensive D.
Pip played her first game as an official member of team hearts. She had some really great tips and won us a lot of important rebounds, allowing us to turn the game over.

It was our first game playing GD/GK together, we both worked really well in putting pressure on the attack, especially in the 3rd quarter forcing them to make extra passes which we were able to turn over.

The overall score was 41-36 to Panthers, with player deservedly awarded to Liv.

Some areas to work on would be timing when making moves and receiving the ball, but overall we had a really good first game and still gained a point for getting within 5.

Note to self, don’t go out the night before a 9:30am match, as you will be playing with a hangover 🫠

Written by Laura – player