Women's 1s v Luton Poly & QMWank

LSE Women’s Hockey 5
Luton Poly 0

LSE Women’s Hockey 2
Queen Mary Wank 3

Last week saw the mighty first team take on Luton Polytechnic, who arrived on the pitch looking like the air stewardesses they all aspire to be. As for our team of mismatches we looked far from serious! Little did they know that appearance isn’t everything as within the first 3 minutes we managed to put one past their far from average keeper. Our lifted spirits continued as Andrea, our new goal scoring machine managed to score a hat trick within 15 minutes, our fifth goal came from club captain Nat who put in a great performance all game. We have to admit that it is extremely strange this year as we seem to have far too many good players, who naturally all play in the same position, so we saw great performance from our midfielders who throughout the game included Abby, Martha, Andrea, Louise, Tara etc.... Our backs had a little more action in the second half, however the easyjet crew were unable to put anything past keeper Kristina. The final score was 5-0, however it could have been more with captain Meenal calling for everyone to ‘get in the D’, shame we didn’t take her seriously! Wednesday night was a bit of a shambles from a girl’s hockey point of view, with myself returning to the Valleys and little enthusiasm within the team, so we had to make up for it this week,

Admittedly we weren’t expecting much from the Queen Mary side, whom we had beaten on every occasion last year, however as we have learnt with our squad a few very good freshers really do make the difference. It turns out our captains took note of Claudio Ranieri’s squad rotation techniques as this week we fielded a changed side. The first half was un-impressive with us trailing 3-0 at half time, luckily the game picked up significantly. We were awarded a suspicious number of short corners from referee’s JJ and Melissa and luckily enough new girls Martha and Andrea converted two in beautiful fashion. The game had improved drastically in the second half and we came off smug, especially certain players who were insistent we had drawn, we hadn’t however, the final score was 3-2 to the Mile End crew.

Wednesday evening proved to be highly successful from a hockey club point of view, with the women’s and men’s first teams going out for dinner prior to the tuns. All this meant was an increased consumption of alcohol and a little bit too much banter! Firstly I have to give special mention to all those people on the no.38 bus on Wednesday night who watched in amazement as certain members of both the public and the AU sang Lion King classics as we drove down Theobalds Road, thanks Simba. Anyway back to the hockey, we arrived in the tuns in record numbers and started putting down the vodkas before our beautiful club rendition of Gina Gee’s ‘Oo Ah Just A Little Bit’, thanks to men’s captain Frodo. A few more vodka’s were drunk and we were ready for Walkabout, as per usual we managed to lose half our team en route but were surprised to find almost the entire men’s team there on arrival which made an evening full of tears, sick and hilarious chatting up techniques even more enjoyable. How someone managed to actually throw up on what seems like half the female population of the AU however is another question. So the evening progressed and Martha our postgrad had the double bonus of not just football club captain Taffy trying to chat her up but second team captain Brummie too, the lucky girl! Admittedly we thought the evening couldn’t get much funnier but again we were proved wrong by the Jade who had earlier complained about the fines being placed on her, all I can say is she more than doubled them.

So the night ended with a record 6 hockey members still in Walkabout at 3am, Rob and Rich had done the boys proud, all that is left for them now is that first virgin trip to Crispy Duck where I learnt neither SU Treasurer Pirate or Football Treasurer Al can count. So all in all a triumphant night for hockey, now all we have to do is keep it up.

Women's 1s v Easyjet

Women’s Hockey 3
Easyjet 2


Luton isn’t exactly a nice place, however we had the added Joy of travelling there with the football firsts, something that would brighten up any young ladies day. Thanks to brake happy driver we arrived in Luton over and hour early, so we decided to take a team outing to Toys r Us to scout out our Barrel costumes, it turns out they don’t sell anything that kinky but we turned a few heads asking....

I said earlier that we took a team outing, that’s kind of a lie due to the fact that we can’t seem to field a whole team at the moment. We thought Nat was joking when she said we only had 9 players, luckily we managed to drag a very ill Melissa out of bed, and so set off with 10 players. Our first obstacle was the lack of a goalie, I think Jade now regrets having bragged about being football goalie as she was immediately stuck between the sticks. We kitted her up and baring in mind the day wasn’t exactly going to plan it couldn’t have got much worse when we realised we’d left one of the kickers at LSE. Luckily the charming young men from Luton’s boys team we’re there to lend a hand.

Our team talk consisted of us deciding that we might as well go out there and have fun, after all it was certainly a mismatch team, with Jade in goal, Jackie covering at the back and a lack of a sweeper, the odds were certainly stacked against us. However, the game started well with the Luton captain insisting on reminding us that we only had 10 players, little did she know that they were 10 very good, skilful, eager players.

Martha immediately ran rings around their centres and both Sarah and Louise had outstanding games on the wings. We took the lead half way into the first half with a carefully placed penalty flick from Martha, which got the adrenaline going, we’d forgotten about that feel good feeling. Unfortunately for us the game picked up pace, and we started to miss that extra player. The Luton attack swept through our defence and after a great stop by Jade it really was ‘f***ing annoying’ that the rebound went in. So as half time approached it was 1-1.

We knew we were better than them, even with 10 players and really wanted to win this match. The second half started off well, with Meenal finally ending her goal drought with our second. Luton’s second came 20 minutes in which really annoyed us, it must have been the offer of free drinks from their really attractive supporters that gave their best player the determination to score.


So we went to push back again, Martha scooped the ball, and hit it to Meenal, the only problem being that one of the Luton girl’s got their sticks in the way, something I imagine they regret now as one of their team mates is looking all the uglier which a very gashed mouth. However we didn’t let this stop us, and we kept attacking their goal line, however Nat and Mel’s goal hanging just didn’t seem to be working. So step up captain Meenal who in the last 2 minutes skilfully slotted in the winner, we were ecstatic...Admittedly it should have been more with the number of shorts we were awarded however we couldn’t quite break that last line of rather large defenders.

The offer of teas was kindly rejected as we cheered on the boys in their last 5 minutes of skilful football before the journey back, which was all the more enjoyable with the firsts singing talents.

Walkabout was as eventful as ever, and we has as bad an attendance as ever, however it didn’t matter because we had won!

Women's 1s v Middlesex

Middlesex 2
LSE 1

It’s Friday morning (well afternoon) and it’s still proving pretty difficult to write this after the debauchery of Wednesday night but we will give it our best shot.

We arrived at the Trent Park campus to find a team of girls, well genetically speaking they were girls but they could easily have beaten the LSE gun club to a bench press competition. Memories of this match last year involve Chrissy running around to her birthday badge signing ‘get down on it’, Polly receiving a ball to her face and our favourite American Nat checking out 11 year old boys, so we were ready for some entertaining once more.

This all started in the locker room when new girl Jade decided to attach a bin bag to her head so as to save it from the torrential downpours that we had experienced en route. The game couldn’t really have started any worse with some big girl putting it past our solid defence within the first 3 minutes, so it was 1-0 Middlesex. After this who knows what could have happened, we have to admit we were surprised they didn’t put at least 8 past us!!! One thing we would suggest to them however is that they learn that waterproof mascara exists, or perhaps black streaks was just part of their scare tactics.

A special mention has to go out to our new favourite yank, Abby, who was running circles around the beasts, it looks like we may actually have found a replacement for Totty, don’t worry though that comparison stays firmly on the pitch. Captain Meenal took one for the team, after nicely stopping a ball from the Russian, with her leg, hope the bruising’s gone down Meenal!

Our other freshers put in solid performances, Ju and Louise proved that they were far fitter than the rest of us, as the thought of running around for 70 minutes was a little too much for some after a summer of pure laziness. A final mention has to go out to Sarah and her green socks, who lifted our spirits in the dying seconds with a beautifully skilful goal.

To be honest after returning from Oakwood resembling drowned rats, the LSE First XI Women’s Hockey team were extremely up for a night out. We all looked extra pretty in our bikini’s and Hawaiian shirts and that’s when the fun began. By the time some of our freshers arrived the rest of us were pretty tipsy (yes yes, notably Munchkin) so they had fun in trying to catch up. Our solid boat race team consisting of Ju, Louise, Sarah and Jade seemed to be the only non-cheats on stage.

To be honest the rest of the evening pretty much turned into a blur after that, time passed a little to quickly for our liking but then Walkabout beckoned. We’re not entirely sure who actually made it as certain 2nd years seemed to disappear, to where is anyone’s guess but probably the number 19 bus.

So once again another Wednesday night with a lack of memories, at least we have some sociable freshers this year who are sure to make their mark in the AU sooner or later. And as for the boys we’d just like to say that we really enjoyed seeing you throw up everywhere, thanks! Oh and that a certain fresher is definitely having double fines all year... sorry!

All girl's match reports to be posted here