Dundee KC 1 – 15 St. Andrews University 1
Sunday, Feb 12, 6pm, Menzieshill CC, Dundee

I’m trying to think of a way to make this sound good… so perhaps it’s best to start by ignoring the scoreline? We did get thumped (not literally, of course), but I do believe that we won in the “making lots of noise every time we scored” competition. 🙂

Dundee’s only goal came midway through the second half, courtesy of a fine long-shot from our trump card Eleanor Legg. However, just like St. Andrews, we had a good number of scoring chances spread right across the game. The only difference was that they sank a good number of theirs, while we managed to miss just about every time. 🙁 With a little more practice of course, we should start putting a few more of those away in future. (Every cloud has a silver lining, after all).

Highlights of the game from our perspective? Well, the most excellent league debuts for Kim, Alan, Ross, and Amy. Also, the fact that all of St. Andrews’ goals came from their boys means that all of our girls must have done a really good job in defence (a clean sheet for the girls is defintely “most excellent”).

Many thanks to Gavin Legg for refereeing, and to St. Andrews for being really good sports throughout, and for delivering us yet another lesson in good korfball.

Match stats:

Mary, Rosie, Steven M, Dayne; Eleanor (1), Kim, Nigel, Alan;
subs: Ross on for Alan at H/T; Rachael on for Kim at H/T; Amy on for Mary after ~40 mins;

MVP: Mary

Dundee KC 4 – 1 Ed. City 2
Ed Uni 3 7 – 5 Dundee KC
Sunday, Dec 4, 2pm, Lynch SC, Dundee

Some more good news: After two more great performances last weekend, Dundee have extended their lead at the top of the development section of the Scottish Korfball League!

We won the first game of our second home double-header by 4 goals to 1 (against Edinburgh City’s second-team), and then narrowly lost out in the second game, which ended 7-5 to Edinburgh University’s third-team. Mary and Rosie both scored 2 cracking long shots to win us the first game, which seemed to be a tale of “nearly” for both teams – there must have been well over 30 shots that “nearly” went in, but the basket pixies seemed to be doing their darnedest to keep the ball from dropping through.

The second game was a different story though, with a reasonable number of shots going in, and a closely balanced game right up until the last few minutes. My own highlight was sneaking in a couple of running in shots just before half time to give us a 4-3 lead, but we struggled to extend that lead (or even hold it) in the second half, and the visiting students did well to finish us off right at the end.

Match stats:

Dundee KC 4 – 1 Ed. City 2
Caroline, Mary(2), Steven M, Graham (Glasgow); Rosie(2), Ashley, Nigel, Dayne
MVP: Rosie

Ed Uni 3 7 – 5 Dundee KC
Caroline, Mary, Steven M, Duncan Stewart (Ed City, 2; sub’d at HT by John Simpson, Ed City, 1); Rosie, Ashley, Nigel (2), Dayne
MVP: Nigel

Dundee’s lead in the development league now extends to 7 points, having won four, drawn two and lost five of their 11 games to date.

Ed Uni 1 16 – 4 Dundee KC
Saturday, Nov 12, 10am, Pleasance SC, Edinburgh.

OK, so our stunning two-game unbeaten run may just have come to an end, but at least we went out in style. It seems that Edinburgh’s students may be considerably better at waking up on a Saturday morning than we are… we went 4 goals down at the start of this match before we’d even blinked. We did have some decent spells in the game though, and we were only trailing by a few goals at half-time (the HT score was something like 8-3 to them). It was also nice to be fielding an almost complete team for a change (thanks to Steven M and Dave W, both making their debut appearances for Dundee). In the end, we only had to borrow one bloke from Ed. Uni., so this was a very good turnout for Dundee. The pace of the game was a little too high for most of our team though, and the fact that our borrowed player scored 3 out of our 4 goals tells a bit of a story – Ed Uni were very good both at scoring (although I think that we did quite well in defence for most of the game), and at putting pressure on us whenever we did get to attack. A lot of that no doubt comes down to experience: knowing when to move and where to move to, and knowing when to shoot and when not to. But we will get there in the end, and this match was a great way to see how it should be done. So feel inspired people… come this time next year, that’s what we ought to look like!

Stats / Divisions

Caroline, Rosie, Nigel (1), Steven M; Mary, Rachael, Jean Fourie (Ed Uni, 3), Dave Wood (Castle).
MVP: Jean (don’t blame me – it’s the opposition who chooses the MVP!)

DKC 12 – 5 St. Andrews 2, DKC 6 – 6 Glasgow 2

Well done to everyone who helped us to win one, draw one on Sunday. Our first home fixtures of the season led to what was probably our best performance so far, with every single player just getting better and better. 🙂

The day got off to a cracking start against St. Andrews 2, with goals flying in from all over the court and some really, really good attacking play.

We did really well In the second game, against Glasgow 2, as well: always either level or one goal in the lead (I think) right up to the final whistle, and doing an extremely good job in defence as well as attack.

Many thanks to Graham and Steve (from Glasgow) and to Brendan and Edwin (from St. Andrews) for standing in and doing so much more than just “making up the numbers” when we were two boys short.

Squads…
vs. St. Andrews 2: Mary (2), Rachael (1), Graham (2), Steve; Caroline (sub’d by Ashley, H/T), Rosie (3), Nigel (4), Dayne.
MVP: Rosie

vs. Glasgow 2: Mary (sub’d by Rachael, H/T, 1), Caroline, Brendan (2), Edwin (1); Ashley, Rosie, Nigel (2 – 1 pen), Dayne.
MVP: Brendan Sage (St. Andrews)

One month into the season, and fresh on the heels of our second league victory, we’ve just gone to the top of the SKA’s development league. Savour this moment, folks:

What’s more, Mary Cooper has gone straight to the top of both the MVP list (MVP 3 times!), and the top-scorer’s table with 7 goals from 4 and two half games. Well done Mary-Lou! 🙂

Here are all the stats I have from our games so far, just to complete the picture:

Date: 2/10/11
Opponents: Edinburgh Mavericks
Venue: Sighthill Campus, Edinburgh
Final score: Mavericks 3 – 4 Dundee
Divisions: Mary Cooper (2), Caroline Cohen (Ashley Dorning H/T), Nigel
Cooper, Ian Volante** (1); Kirsty Campbell, Lucie Maupetit* (Rachael Brown H/T), Steve Gilchrist, Graham Robertson* (1).
* – borrowed from Glasgow
** – borrowed from Mavs
MVP: Steve Gilchrist

Date: 2/10/11
Opponents: St. Andrew’s University 1
Venue: Sighthill Campus, Edinburgh
Final score: Dundee 1 – 17 St. Andrews
Divisions: Lucie Maupetit* (Mary Cooper H/T), Caroline Cohen (Ashley Dorning H/T), Nigel Cooper, John Wright** (Mark ?** H/T);  Kirsty Campbell, Rachael Brown, Steve Gilchrist (Steve Lawrence** (1) H/T), Graham Robertson*.
* – borrowed from Glasgow
** – borrowed from Mavs
MVP: Steve Lawrence**

Date: 9/10/11
Opponents: Edinburgh City 1
Venue: Westwoods Health Club, Edinburgh
Final score: City 7 – 3 Dundee
Divisions: Mary Cooper (2), Ashley Dorning (Lucie Maupetit* H/T), Nigel Cooper, Steve Anderson* (Dayne Beccano H/T); Kirsty Campbell, Rachael
Brown (1), Steve Gilchrist, Graham Robertson*.
* – borrowed from Glasgow
MVP: Nigel Cooper

Date: 9/10/11
Opponents: Edinburgh University 4
Venue: Westwoods Health Club, Edinburgh
Final score: Dundee 4 – 4 Ed Uni
Divisions: Lucie Maupetit*, Ashley Dorning, Nigel Cooper (1) (Graham Robertson* (1) H/T), Dayne Beccano; Kirsty Campbell (Mary Cooper H/T),
Rachael Brown (1),  Steve Gilchrist, Steve Anderson* (1).
* – borrowed from Glasgow
MVP: Mary Cooper

Date: 23/10/11
Opponents: Edinburgh University 2
Venue: Shawlands Academy, Glasgow
Final score: Dundee 7 – 5 Ed Uni
Divisions: Dayne Beccano, Nigel Cooper, Ashley Dorning, Rosie Henshaw
(3); Mary Cooper (3), Caroline Cohen, Scott Greig (1), Martin ?*.
* – borrowed from Glasgow
MVP: Mary Cooper

Date: 23/10/11
Opponents: Glasgow 1
Venue: Shawlands Academy, Glasgow
Final score: Dundee 0 – 7 Glasgow
Divisions: Dayne Beccano, Nigel Cooper, Ashley Dorning, Rosie Henshaw;
Mary Cooper, Caroline Cohen, Scott Greig, Martin ?*.
* – borrowed from Glasgow
MVP: Mary Cooper

Well done to everyone who helped us to win our first ever game on Sunday, and to those who helped us to lose our second one! Aside from Steve G’s blistered foot, and the subsequent umpteen-to-one defeat by St. Andrews, I suspect that we all had a great first day out in Edinburgh. We won our first match was against Edinburgh Mavericks 4-3, with goals from Ian Volante (kindly on loan from Mavs, and possibly never to be let back into the fold after his stunning second-half long-shot), Graham Robertson (on loan from Glasgow) and Mary Cooper (2). We then went on to get thrashed by St. Andrews in our second match; we conceded at least 14 goals, but countered admirably in the second half with a very impressive single goal. 🙂

Squads…
vs. Mavs: Mary (2), Caroline (sub’d by Ashley, H/T), Nigel, Ian V (Mavs, 1); Kirsty, Lucie (Glasgow. sub’d by Rachael, H/T), Steve, Graham (Glasgow).
vs. St. Andrews: Lucie (Glasgow. sub’d by Mary, H/T), Caroline (sub’d by Ashley, H/T), Nigel, John Wright (Mavs, sub’d by Steve Lawrence, Mavs, H/T); Kirsty, Rachael, Steve G (sub’d by Mark?, Mavs, H/T), Graham (Glasgow).