The football finals opened the BUCS Championships in fine style, with both the men's and the women's finals taking place yesterday.
As Britain’s largest student sporting event, the BUCS Championships provide a real incentive to student athletes looking to perform at the peak of their game and to enjoy world class facilities. In football, the Championship is the top team prize (after the league - won by Leeds) and the competition is fierce. The Trophy is also hotly contested by the teams in the lower tiers of the BUCS women's football leagues.
Both women's games were tightly contested matches, with a thrilling penalty shoot out deciding the showpiece Women’s Football Championship Final between Leeds Met (with several Leeds Carnegie players in their ranks) and Northumbria (pictured, made up largely of Sunderland and Newcastle Utd players) at Sheffield United’s Bramall Lane. These two sides were both finalists last season, with Leeds running out winners and so there was an extra edge to proceedings.
Despite Northumbria’s Rachel Furness rattling the post within a minute, it was Leeds Met who began to dominate the early stages, pressing Northumbria all over the pitch and retaining the ball well. A goal from Rachel Lee finally gave Leeds the deserved lead. A raking cross-field ball from Carla Cantrell picked out Lee on the right, who then cut inside and despatched a curling shot into the far corner beyond Abby Jones.
Although Leeds Met’s quality was evident, they failed to convert their dominance into clear cut chances, and their profligacy was exposed early in the second half by a fine Northumbria equaliser. A corner was swung in from the left, neatly laid off by Furness into the path of the impressive Vicki Greenwell, who sent a fierce shot into the roof of the net from twenty yards to make the score 1-1. Despite the play becoming stretched in the final twenty minutes, neither side was able to make a breakthrough, and after a draining thirty minutes of extra time, the game went to penalties.
With the pressure mounting it was Leeds who cracked, with Sophie Walton sending her penalty high over the bar. Northumbria edged ahead and it was left to captain Steph Bannon to net the final penalty, and claim a dramatic 5-3 shoot out victory.
Meanwhile, earlier in the day Oxford claimed the Women’s Trophy (and their first ever BUCS title) with a 2-1 victory over Bedfordshire.
University Football Info
Women's football is a key area of the BUCS football development strategy. With over 150 teams in the BUCS leagues women's football is one of the largest female BUCS sports. This number is constantly increasing with more and more women being introduced to the game whilst studying at university.
In conjunction with this there are many U19, U23 and full international players currently studying at universities in the HE sector. This indicates the high standard of women's football in BUCS member institutions and the calibre of players that are regularly playing in BUCS league fixtures.
Report compiled with thanks to Andrew Magee @ www.bucs.org.uk
