lofcwomen.com

26 Sep 2024

Finally Orient women's league programme will get under way this Sunday 29th Sept 2024 with a tough away match against an always-strong Camden Town women's team. The clubs faced off against each other last season for the first time (on the modern era at least). The outcomes were a 2:1 win for our ladies in the away game, a 2:2 draw but a defeat on penalties in the league cup and a 2:2 draw at the Myrak ground. That's looks as close to honours-even as you could get.
Camden have begun this season's league campaign as strongly as ever starting with a 6:1 victory over newcomers CandI Utd followed by an impressive 2:1 win at perennial title chasers Comets WFC. They did suffer a reverse in the FA cup by losing 3:2 to fellow GLWFL Premier side South London Firsts who themselves are looking a formidable side.
The match will be played at the Wingate and Finchley FC ground (find it on Google Maps) which is one of the best venues in this league. If you wish to go along you'll be comfortable and under cover. Kick-off is at 2pm. If you can't do that but would like see a live-text 'blow by blow' account of the game, we will be providing our famed Live-Text service on the day. More details later.
The big question is.... will the new look Orient women's team have enough about them to gather the three points needed to to build towards a successful season? Promotion is the openly stated aim. Last Sunday's demolition of Oaklands Wolves with an 11:3 scoreline doesn't really say too much when you look at the details. We understand the Wolves keeper was a last-minute stand-in and of such stature than any high ball was going to be difficult for her. We note that Wolves have made a social media plea for a new keeper.
Perhaps of greater concern is how Wolves' striker Emily McMillan found herself through, un-challenged, to a one-on-one with O's keeper Delainy Savill, herself making her starting debut. Emily broke free on three occasions and expertly scored a first half hat-trick from those opportunities. Camden's defence will not be offering the glut of chances which enabled Emily's hat-trick to be overwhelmed by eleven goals going in the other end. We did notice that such breakaways were stopped in the second half, perhaps Tayla Gencarelli's introduction had something to do with that?

The reward for getting past Oaklands Wolves in last Sunday's FA Cup 2nd preliminary round is a trip to Essex club Hutton FC - that and £3000 prize money. That will go up to £4000 if we can beat Hutton, we get £1000 if we lose.
Hutton are based in and around the Brentwood area, they are a large multi-team club with men's, women's and youth sides. They have access to a number of football pitches so, at the time of writing, our game will be at one of them - we don't know which at the moment.
Hutton play in the Eastern Region Women's Football League, that's a Tier Six league (one above us) but it's worth noting we played both Hutton and Stanway Pegasus from that league during pre-season and beat them both. Pre-season games have little to do with competitive matches but it's nice to have the bragging rights. Hutton's current form is good at at P4, W3, L1.

Soon there will be opportunities to become a women's player kit sponsor, the final details are not yet to hand but we'll bring them to you as soon as know what they are. This is our man-at-the-match Larry Peterson with a shirt from last year's keeper Lola Duroyaiye. We at LOFCWOMEN.COM sponsored Lola last season and, as part of that arrangement, we (in this case It's Larry) received the signed shirt from the player concerned. It is an excellent way to show encouragement to the player/s of your choice and confirm your support for the individual and team. Larry assured us he flipped a coin on everyone's behalf and declared it came down as he called it - so he got to hang on to the shirt.
The shirt has been signed by the entire squad too!
(STOP PRESS) If you would like to know more, email Henry Bloom at the club on: [email protected]

Not exactly a year ago but as we approach our first GLWFL game of the 2024/25 season, we take a brief look back to 3rd September 2023 when we started our league programme as a newly promoted club. Matched against long-term Premier division club Richmond and Kew, many of us didn't really have a clear idea as to what to expect. It was not known then but Richmond would go on to win the championship and gain promotion to tier 6 of the Football Assoc. Women's National league hierarchy. However, goals from Leanne Bates (31 mins) and a Shona Chitate Samuriwo special on the stroke of half time meant it was the East Londoners who took the three points at Buckhurst Hill on that day. The Os went on do the double over Richmond by winning in their own back yard in November where Leanne Bates (of course), Liliana Almeida, Ellie Landen and Charlotte Lynch each scored in a fine 4:2 away victory. Sadly, we understand it was at that first game that Victoria Baah, a closed season recruit from the Daggers, sustained a bad injury and was unable to play again. Fingers crossed we'll get to see Victoria do her stuff soon.

A big thank you to our contributors, we truly welcome your input! If you have any comments related to the women's teams, we'd be very happy to hear from you. You can reach out via email, 'X', Instagram, or WhatsApp at +0385913080531. All the links are available on our home page.
We look forward to your contributions.