Womens Weekend Roundup!

WPD: Cork City 0-2 Peamount United

It wasn’t the start Cork City FC women wanted to the 20204 season, with Peamount leaving Turners Cross with three points courtesy of Irish International Erin Mclaughlin and Peamount Captain Karen Duggan, but Manager Danny Murphy was buoyed by the positives he took from the game. “Overall, as a team performance in the game I thought we’ve done well, especially when you look at where we’ve come from and how we’re progressing and developing. I felt we were very competitive from a strength and fitness point of view and that goes to show what the girls have put in through the off-season and they’ve brought that onto the pitch. We pressed really well the first 25 minutes and that created a great chance just two minutes in. A couple of the girls who have joined recently probably need a week or two more but by the end of the month their strength and sharpness will be where we need.”

Murphy was pleased with the contribution of the debutants “I though Colleen (Kennedy) did really well across 90 minutes, only her second full 90 after a period without a game. Dorothea only came in last Wednesday, so it was important to get her some minutes and into the mix with the girls and we felt she did well, slowed the game a little and exerted control which we needed to happen, as it was a bit helter-skelter.”

“There are things we can improve. We had a game plan we wanted to exploit wide areas but we went to try and play that ball all the time, and sometimes from too deep so after the game we spoke about taking that extra pass to draw a defender in and create space behind. We probably went a little too direct, but that’s me being picky as we want to keep improving” he smiles “I think we limited them to very few chances, and if that game was last year, I don’t think it would have been a 2-0 scoreline, it would have been more. We went one down, but the girls kept going, there was no individual errors in the goals conceded, but areas as a system we can defend better.”

“Loads of positives, tidy up on a few small things and we’ll be a more successful team. Once the new players gel, we have real competition for places and there were probably players who have done really well in pre-season who didn’t get gametime yesterday because we have that competition now, and it will drive standards on. It’s good for us as a staff, and it makes your decisions harder, but we’re going in the right direction.”

WU17: CK United 0-4 Cork City

Two from two to start the season for Craig Robinson’s WU17 and he couldn’t be happier “Delighted with Saturday’s win, two wins to start off which is great for the confidence for a new squad. Another clean sheet which is great for the defenders and keepers and shows the girls are working hard off the ball too. We had four different goal scorers in the game, three scoring their first City goals”.

Those four goal scorers were Lucia Lynch, Faye Dunlea, Alice Murphy and Amy McCarthy and Robinson praised the spread of goals “That’s six different scorers in two games now which is great. Performance was much better this week, controlled the game with some great passages of play and the players were delighted with that themselves. All 18 players involved in the squad got minutes, it won’t happen every week, but it’s great to involved everyone and the subs yesterday injected energy and for the second week in a row we had a goal scorer off the bench in Alice Murphy.”

WU19: Cork City 2-0 Waterford FC

It was a good win in tough conditions and a heavy pitch at Bishopstown yesterday as the WU19 side maintained their 100% start to the season. Manager Trish Fennelly-Hunt was happy overall but knows there’s more to come. “Happy with the three points and the clean sheet, it’s something that we like to do. To start off we were a bit scrappy but as the game progressed, we got more of the ball and got the two goals in the first half which was a nice boost” she said.

Those goals came from a close-range Kayleigh Still finish after a great underlapping run and cross from Zoe Finnerty. It was Finnerty who scored the second, a powerful back-post header after a wonderful Jaydine Seward delivery. And those goals really pleased Fennelly-Hunt. “We all agreed that we didn’t play to our best, we know we can play a lot better but to be in that position, still grinding out the win, we’re happy with that. Waterford gave us a really good game; it was quite physical, and it was good to see the girls stand up to that physicality. Another three points on the board, god performance at time and a clean sheet.”