Hockey: Women

Redditch 2 Tenbury 1

A GOAL apiece from Becky Southwell and Emma Preston in the final four minutes helped Redditch to snatch a dramatic victory to maintain their title challenge.

And this was after Tenbury had taken the lead from a controversial corner with just five minutes remaining on the clock.

With the teams level on points in second place in Worcestershire Division One this was always going to be a close and tense game.

Both sides were determined and showed good skills in a match that was spoiled by inconsistent umpiring - for both sides - by the Tenbury official.

The first half saw both sides press hard for the opener. Redditch were not quite as fluent as last week but they still put together good passing moves and created the clearer chances with Anna Stafford driving hard down the right while Jo Stafford's shot went just wide.

Redditch's midfield worked hard to close down and Lianne Cooper did a fine marking job on Tenbury's most dangerous player.

The second half continued in a similar fashion with play swinging from end to end. Southwell and Preston, joint players of the match, showed good control and worked tirelessly all game to get the breakthrough, going close from corners early in the second half.

Meanwhile young Amie Richards in goal made a crucial clearance to keep the score at 0-0 and Helen Moore made a number of well-timed tackles at left back.

Although the game had been exciting, no-one was prepared for the dramatic end to the game. First Kirsty Stafford was shown a yellow card for a tackle in her defending circle, a card which was changed to red for dissent.

Redditch were now down to ten players and, a few minutes later, Tenbury were awarded a controversial short corner when it should have been a Redditch ball after a foul on Claire Steadman. To Redditch's dismay Tenbury scored from the corner.

To their huge credit they battled on and forced a penalty corner and a hard strike from Southwell found the net off a defender. A share of the spoils was no more than Redditch deserved but there was still time for a final twist.

Redditch pushed forward and, with virtually the final attack of the game, Preston forced the ball over the line.

The result leaves Redditch second behind Worcester 2nds in a very close league with six games to go. The Bromsgrove Road side will be hoping for another three points when they travel to Birmingham for a match with Harborne 2nds on Saturday.

Redditch 2nds stayed top of Worcestershire Division Three with an emphatic 5-0 win at Leominster.

Two goals by Emma Allsop kept up her excellent strike rate. Player of the match Olivia Laxton came on for the final 20 minutes and set up two goals for Becci Butler with Beth Blair completing the scoring.