by John Bacon

Woodbride Town 2
Haringey 3

Borough Women finally ended their nightmare run of eleven defeats without even a goal to show for their efforts.

In the unusual setting of an ex-USAF nuclear bomber base The Woodpeckers started the stronger team and stand-in keeper Aisha Hayatuddini was in regular action, getting down well to smother the ball on many occasions.

Lekesha James had an early one-on-one but lost out to home custodian Faye Lunn.

It was a match full of whole-hearted commitment from both teams with no quarter asked or given and midfielder Stephanie Cooper often to be found in the thick of the action.

But it was the home side who took the lead after 25 minutes as a free-kick landed among a ruck of players a few yards from Borough’s goal and Justine Peacock reacted quickest to lash it home.

Borough battled back and Jade Bowley went close before, twelve minutes later, Lekesha James put an end to 1,027 minutes of erstwhile fruitless endeavour by driving home an equaliser low and hard after making space in the penalty area.

Woodbridge should have regained the lead before half time when a long bouncing ball caused havoc in the Borough defence and with Hayatuddini off her line the ball was lifted a foot over the open net.

After the interval manager Mark Tweed’s half-time instructions worked a treat as right from the kick off James raced forward when the ball was played back to Erika Vareckova, whose perfectly weighted long through pass fell right into James’ stride, and another accurate low finish put Borough ahead.

Confidence and self-belief, understandably lacking after such a dismal sequence of previous results, visibly flowed through the Borough ranks and they even shrugged off the loss of the lead only two minutes later when the un-marked Jemma Yarnton met a free kick with an unstoppable header on the six yard line.

It was now anyone’s game and Lunn did well to frustrate Julia Carruthers as she chased through after long balls.

Bowley headed inches wide at the near post when good work down the right enabled Cooper to fire over an inviting cross.

Borough now looked like the team with the greater desire and fifteen minutes from time Carruthers lifted a very high lob over Lunn and breath was held to see if it would clear the bar as well but to Borough’s delight it just dropped under the junction of bar and post.

Borough had plenty of defending to do in the remaining period with Karla Parker and Annika Quartey doggedly blocking the middle while Maria Gomes and Gareeca Gordon battled to restrict the flow of balls from out wide.

Even so Hayatuddini had to make an outstanding save as she dived to her left to deflect a long low drive away for a corner and later had to judge her advance perfectly to narrow the angle sufficiently to force a cross shot to flash inches outside the far post, when a striker raced in from the left completely in the clear.

Borough had to withstand a series of corners and free kicks in the closing minutes and survived without too many close calls although it was fortunate that the home side’s finishing was not as sharp as it needed to be.

The three points opens up the possibility of Borough finishing out of the relegation spots if they can put together four wins from their remaining six matches and, although they remain bottom, they will overtake Cambridge University on goal difference if they bring back the points from next Sunday's visit.