East London’s winning streak came to a humbling end as they fell to a 61-30 defeat to Anglia Ruskin at the Sportsdock.
Before yesterday, East London had won all of their three games this season. However, fresh from scoring an impressive 84 points in their Southern Conference clash against Writtle last week, Ruskin put on another imperious performance to dominate proceedings throughout.
Ruskin Quick To Dominate
The game started how you would imagine between two teams in great form with plenty of early scores and high enthusiasm in the opening stages and there was little to split the two teams at five apiece heading into the final third of the first quarter.
However, this was when the game started to slip away for East London, and the fruitful combination of Ruskin’s Goal-Attack, Jemma Bowman, and Goal-Shooter, Sarah Orme began to assert their authority on the game.
Ruskin scored five quick points courtesy of rapid ball rotation and surgical accuracy in their passing to take a 10-6 lead into the second quarter.
Trying To Regain Momentum
East London introduced last week’s player of the match Kim Lawrence into the game in the second quarter to try and recapture some of last week’s much-needed accuracy from Goal-Shooter.
Initially, it had the desired effect as she scored four quick points to bring her side well back into the game at 11-12.
But East London failed to capitalise on this promising momentum as Ruskin scored 14 of the next 17 points to take a commanding 26-14 lead at half-time.
East London will lament allowing Ruskin the opportunities to wrestle back momentum with a number of offside decisions going against them just as they were forcing their way back into the game.
Ruskin’s Impressive Performance
At half-time, East London captain Immie Long called for better defence from her side, but any team would have struggled with the deftness of attack and impressive fitness on display during the entirety of the second half by Ruskin.
They were consistently able to pierce the tiniest of gaps, and manufacture scoring opportunities with creative movement and audacious, accurate passing.
By the end of the third quarter, Ruskin had ended any hopes of a monumental comeback from East London with an impressive 19 points scored.
The fourth quarter exemplified the talent of Ruskin’s Goal-attack, Bowman. Her intricate movement, confident receiving and unremitting accuracy in front of goal put a tired East London to the sword as Ruskin extended their lead further.
By the end of the match, she’d scored 39 points, some of which came from seemingly impossible angles and distances.
East London Looking To Bounce Back
At the end of the game Lawrence was left to rue the absence of some key players, but believes the loss will not have any long term effects on the side.
She said “We were down a couple of our strongest players because a couple of the girls are ill. We were moving too quickly and weren’t as familiar working as a team together.
Denying the defeat would affect the team going forward, she added “I think everyone is still raring to go and win because they know now we need to win as many as we can to get as high as we can in the league. So now we’ve lost one, it will make the team work harder if anything.”
Player of the match: Jemma Bowman (Ruskin)
East London: Kimberley Lawrence, Claudia Mayisokele, Ellie Eaton, Laura Clarke, Lauren Bolger, Kirsty Nicholson, Abigail Atoki, Immie Long, Tracy Tait.
Anglia Ruskin: Charlotte Read, Jess Bunting, Esha Mehta, Eve Tselentakis, Hannah Berry, Jemma Bowman, Sarah Orme, Ariane McMillan, Holly Talkington.
