Match Reports – Saturday 29th November 2025

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Women’s 1s  6 – 0  London Edwardian 1s

The OC’s Ladies X1 were away against London Edwardians W1s. An early start didn’t stop a strong team performance. It was a high-intensity game with good link-ups throughout.

Lily created the first goal with a drive down the left into the top of the D, hitting a great shot across to Ruth, who was perfectly placed on the right post to tap it in.

Despite Dani playing the supposedly “boring” position of centre-back, she still made the scoresheet. A short corner resulted in a clean strike straight to the backboard. The lead grew again after consistent pressure, with Saskia’s shot deflected in by Ruth on the post.

With the second half underway, the focus was on structure, which helped keep the team in a comfortable position for the rest of the game. A team effort in the D earned a penalty flick, which Lolly converted confidently. Even at 4–0, the team kept pushing. Easy added the next goal, deflecting in a lifted pass from a great baseline run by Dani.

Strong defensive transfers and link-ups across the pitch kept the momentum going. The final goal reflected the whole game: great team play from start to finish. Even the umpire, in his Edwardians kit, applauded the move. From Sam, to Emma, to Lolly, to Dani, and finished by Alex, securing a 6–0 win.

Goals: Ruth x2, Lolly, Dani, Easy, Alex

MOM: Holly – great runs all over the pitch and essential ball-carrying up the sidelines to help create goals.

DOD: Bella – for losing 5+ items, spilling Molly’s coffee, and forgetting her astros.

Spirit Stick: Dani – for holding down the defence and playing centre-back out of position.

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Hamstrings  1 – 6  Southgate
It always looked likely to be a tough proposition, and so it proved. Versus the top of the league away, with 5 of our stalwart troops absent.
But we remained optimistic and up for the challenge ahead. CJ’s recent Speed Awareness Course was soon paying dividends, and the CJ Bus raced to the ground in record time.
After a fairly swift 3-0 down, with more leaks at the back than a Rachel-from-Accounts’ Budget, _The Bearded Wonder_ GK convened an Emergency Defence Meeting, and his wise words were mainly taken on board – “Be better at defending”. 
4-0 down at half time. Team spirit tested. Team spirit intact.
Lesser men would have dissolved in the downpours, but not this team. We improved in the second half, giving the ball away less, and keeping our shape.
Unfortunately a second-half flick decision in favour of Southgate, much like bestiality in a multi-storey car park, was wrong on so many levels. But we soldiered on.
A very well drilled oppo scored 3 shorts and 2 flicks in all, but like Farage’s schoolday misdemeanours those were soon forgotten by the sodden crowd, who left the ground remembering only the OC’s beautiful goal, of slick interchange, and inch-perfect passing.
From deep in his own half Robin swept the ball majestically into the inside channel, where Howie advanced menacingly & then threaded a sweet pass through to the perfectly positioned Manmeet on the right side of the D. He expertly slammed in a cross which goal-poacher Ado prodded into the net, to add to his season’s prodigious goal haul.
A 6-1 loss in the end, but at home with our full squad we will no doubt be more than a match for that strong oppo.
Following the MoM self-vote last week, Eastie decided to self-vote for DoD, and there were no dissenters.
MoM – Jon East
DoD – Jon East
Goalscorer – Adrian White
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Women’s 6s  2 – 0  Old Kingstonian W2’s

Another late cold match at the Reeds pitch, which saw another solid cohesive team performance from the ladies, who were short on numbers and carrying injuries.

A bit of drama at the start, when a wayward mouthguard escaped from a sock during the warm-up and despite the whole squad combing the pitch – we could not find it  (the pitch was covered in leaves!!).  Luckily, it did reveal itself during the 1st half. Phew!

Our 1st goal came from a short corner, with Claire receiving at the top of the D, realised it was too funky for a straight strike, so slipped it right to Amanda, who took a shot at left post, that Darcie caught and flicked into goal. Beautiful!

The 2nd goal was from open play, when Darcie fired the ball into the D from the right wing. Karen collected it at P spot and whammed it into the goal! Brilliant! Taking us into the 2nd half with 2 – 0.

OK’s came back fighting and holding them at 2 – 0 for the second half was easier said than done. We conceded a few short corners, one of which we had to face with only 3 defenders (after breaking the line too soon, not once, but twice – eek!). It got pretty hairy in the last quarter, and Freya saved several goals, fired at full pelt, but this along with a consistent team effort from the defenders kept our clean sheet. Woop woop!

With this win, we continue to hold second place on the league.

POM to Karen with mentions to Freya and Philly.

Special thanks to Paula and Gus for umpiring.

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Women’s 7s  2 – 3  Epsom

OC Ladies 7s put in a really strong effort on Saturday, even though we ended up losing 3–2 in what was a very close game from start to finish.Epsom got the opening goal, which wasn’t the start we wanted, but we didn’t let it throw us off. We settled quickly and started putting some good passes together, and Erin finished a great move to bring us level at 1–1. Epsom then went ahead again after scoring from a penalty flick, but we kept pushing and were rewarded just before half-time when Jeanette scored to make it 2–2.
The second half stayed tight, with both teams fighting hard for the next goal. Sadly, Epsom got the breakthrough from a short corner, putting them 3–2 up. We kept battling and created chances, but couldn’t quite find another equaliser before the final whistle.
Even though the result didn’t go our way, there was loads to be proud of — great teamwork, hard work all over the pitch, and two really well-taken goals. Lots of positives to take into the next match.
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Ladies 5s  2 – 2  Barnes Stormers
Having secured 7 points in the last 3 games, we started confidently against a strong Barnes side. There was lots of beautiful passing and even when Barnes scored, we kept pushing and were rewarded with the equaliser after a beautiful cross from Hildegard to Bernie.
Unfortunately, Barnes scored again at the end of the first half, but we managed to equalise again, with yet another beautiful cross from Hildegard, this time to Colleen. Final score was 2:2.
It was a great game with lots of ball possession and some wonderful passing through all the zones. POM went to Lucy, who was rock solid in defence as usual, but there were lots of mentions as everyone has had a fantastic day today. Let’s keep this going!
Written by Jenny Ripley

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Puricrans  5 – 0  Surbiton 

A very easy win in what was a very poor game of hockey.

On a positive note our short corner routine worked well and Peter kept another clean sheet, his 2nd in 3 outings which should really have been 3 from 3.

Leach returned from Asia and scored from our second corner ahead of Lee Marnitz and 3 goals from Andy Mac to complete the scoring. The final goal of Andy’s hattrick was an expert lob that caught out Frosty in Surbiton’s goal.

A big game coming up on Saturday away at BromBecks in a game that will show if we really have league winning potential and pedigtree.

MOM Andy Sanders

Golden Glove Peter Swift

Goals Andy Macleod (3) Lee Marnitz and Rob Leach.