Hockey: Timperley Ladies 1 - 0 Rochdale Ladies

Gill Owen played what was likely her final match for Rochdale Ladies

For their last away match of the season Rochdale played Timperley 4ths, and with the sad likelihood of it being Gill Owen's final match Rochdale wanted to send her off with a bang - preferably a win.

However, they were up against a very quick Timperley team, who promptly established a habit of intercepting any and all passes not already in their possession. Though even that wasn't enough to break through Rochdale's defence in open play. Even when Rochdale had pushed up in search of a goal, leaving Hoyle and Partington to defend against pairs of Timperley strikers, they blocked them out.

A particularly impressive moment was when Hoyle dropped her stick one handed to stop the ball, that just nicely tapped it up the top of the D where Hodcroft had run in as backup, who was then perfectly placed to receive it and run off up the pitch on a counter attack. She got it all the way back into Timperley's half with Knowles and Pickering before Timperley were able to interrupt.

Timperley were finally able to score from a short corner, with some luck on their side because Leech hurtled out to defend and tapped the ball away from the first receiver before she could take a strike. Unfortunately Leech wasn't able to control it and another Timperley player was able to fire it into the D before she could. Regardless Rochdale kept creating chances for themselves in Timperley's D. Knowles slammed the ball diagonally towards Collinson who had run into the D, she got it under control and took a strike, but Timperley were able to deflect it away from their goal.

Similarly Hockaday fired some cracking balls across the pitch and into the D, but unfortunately none of them were converted into a goal. It was a tactic that Rochdale kept up throughout the match, with Hockaday and Knowles knocking the ball between them to work Rochdale into Timperley's D. Rochdale's defence were staying strong, despite being called upon to hold off a couple more short corners. In general, Hoyle and Owen were weeding out most of Timperley's attempts although Partington was required to make some excellent saves.

After a round of substitutions Collinson was back in comfortable ground as a centre back, and it showed when she used a reverse stick to effortlessly block a pass into Rochdale's D, and then took a single touch to control before she took off running up the pitch. Her progress was quickly halted by the umpire's whistle saying Rochdale had no advantage from a foul against them. In the centre ground Black and Hodcroft were tackling and hassling every Timperley player with the ball, and Pickering drove into any free space she could find when she had the ball.

Rochdale were playing well as a team to work their way down the pitch, even a green card briefly reducing them to ten players didn't cause much consternation, and their progress over the season was clearly on display even if they couldn't find the goal they wanted.

The final score was 0-1, with no Rochdale goal scorers. Player of the match was Claire Hockaday.

Captain Collinson said: "Gill, we cannot thank you for everything you’ve done for Rochdale and women’s hockey over the years. We will miss you dearly. We all hope it’s not your last game but if it is, you know where we are when you’re home visiting. We didn’t get the goals this week but it was a great display.”

Rochdale's team:
Keeper; Sam Partington.
Defence; Claire Hoyle, Kieran Leech, Becki Moon & Gill Owen.
Midfield; Dionne Collinson, Gemma Hodcroft, Paula McDonald & Roisin Pickering.
Forwards; Lily Black & Becky Knowles.
Substitutes: Katie Burrell, Claire Hockaday & Hannah Palmer.