 Sheffield Wednesday Womens F.C. took a break from the league and welcomed Everton Ladies to Worksop Town for there first round Tesco Womens Premier League Cup game. Everton showed great respect to the Owls and the competition by fielding their strongest line-up including England hero's Rachel Brown, Fara Williams and Jill Scott. Wednesday without the injured Rachel Lee and also missing Tanya Rich, Lucy Short and Emily Scott where still able to field a strong squad of 16.
But it was Everton who started brightest, when Gwen Harris opened the scoring after just 2 minutes with a composed finish beating the Owls keeper Maslin. The first half then went on to produce good possession football from both teams and it seemed like Harris's goal woke the Wednesday team up as they looked to pull a goal back. In-form Owls star Sarah Danby, playing out of position on the left flank, looked a natural, using her pace and skill on more than one occassion to beat the Everton full back, but try as they did the Wednesday attack was unable to convert their hard work and quality into a goal. Everton continued to work hard, playing some neat football through the middle of the park, with the likes of Williams, Scott and Harris combining well to put together some effective combinations, but the Owls midfield of De Silva and Gingell did they jobs very well in protecting the Owls back line on more then one occassion. Both teams continued to look for the second goal, and Wednesday nearly came close with some neat two touch football that resulted with Hollie Barker giving England left back Rachel Unitt a tough battle down the Wednesday right. But with nothing between the teams, they went in at half time with Everton leading 1-0
The second half started where the first half finished with high tempo, quality possession football from both teams, Wednesday coming up against some of the best individuals in the Womens game, stood their ground and showed great desire and quality in tracking the energetic Everton midfield three and when regaining the ball looked to keep possession by hitting the feet of Laura Windle, who on this performance seems to be now showing the kind of quality the Owls technical staff know she can produce. But has the game went on it was Everton who took the chance to go 2-0 up, with a neat finish from Tash Dowie, who had seen plenty of the ball throughout the game by making some terrific runs to show for feet. Wednesday kept pushing the Everton back line, with the likes of Danby, Barker, Skeemer and Windle showing great quality in looking for a way into goal. But it was Everton who once again took a chance to go further in the lead on 65 mins with a well worked goal from Jody Handley.Then after 75 minutes of pure work ethic to go with there quality the Wednesday team started to tire with dignity and honour as Everton increased there lead through Tash Dowie, grabbing her second of the game. Dowie then went on to slot home an injury time penalty to give her a hat-trick and Everton a 5-0 victory.
Head Coach Dan Duke commented "We are reasonably pleased with our performance today, Everton are a top side and fielded their strongest possible 11 and we were right in the thick of it for a good hour. Everton have scored early which woke us up but after that we created some good chances which if we had taken we would have been right back in it. I personally have a lot of respect for Everton as they do their business in the right way on and off the field. Today proved that if we are at the top of our game we can compete with anyone on the pitch but it also highlighted exactly where we have room for improvement. All in all we have taken a lot of positives from todays fixture and we will build on them for the coming few weeks in our league fixtures"
Owls Chairman Jeff Maslin commented" I was absolutely delighted with todays performance and I think each member of our squad showed they had the right to be on the same pitch as theses internationals. I would also like to thank all the Everton players and staff for their professionalism after the game when approached for autographs by a horde of young supporters. It was an absolute pleasure in hosting them and we wish them well with their european and league campaigns. They are a credit to the Womens game"
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