Essex Open lost 56-30 to Billericay at Redbridge Sports Centre today.
Premier Division 3
Essex Open 36 Billericay 60
Essex Open suffered their latest premiership defeat in a difficult season as they lost 60-36 to Billericay. However, the game was much closer than the scoreline suggests and this young Essex team continue to improve.
Unfortunately, as has been the pattern in recent games Essex got off to a very poor start going 6 goals behind before they managed to score themselves. For the rest of the first quarter however Essex more than matched their opponents. In the centre court Nicole Alves, Rebecca Wilks and Jasmine Easterbrook We are fighting hard to gain control of possession. In the shooting circle Sophia Sefton and Louise Acons were starting to convert chances into goals. However due to the poor start they made Essex found themselves 18 -8 down at the end of the first quarter.
Essex were defending well with debutant Charlotte Peters and Le Braya Buffon working well against a good Billericay attack. Essex started to make inroads into the deficit but unfortunately Billericay continued to score frequently making the Essex task more difficult. When the half time whistle went Essex were 18-30 down but I had produced a much better display in the quarter.
In the third quarter Essex made a change in the shooting circle moving in defender the prior Le Braya Buffon to goal shooter. This paid immediate dividends as for the first time Essex dominated the game scoring 8 goals with Billericay managing only 3 in reply. Unfortunately, however an inexperienced Essex line-up gave the ball away too often when they held the initiative. The quarter however was very evenly matched with both sides scoring 11 goals. Going into the final quarter Essex needed a big effort to reduce the arrears. Unfortunately, however they allowed Billericay to totally dominate the game and at one stage Billericay scored 11 goals without response. This undid a lot of the good work that Essex had done in the previous 2 quarters. When the final whistle went Essex had suffered another big defeat but were much better than the score line suggested.
Campbell, Le Buffong, Alves, Peters, R Wilks, Brabrook, Stevens, Eastabrook, Acons, Sefton
