Fans of Leyton Orient Women

20 April 2026

Monday Update:

• Ben's Academicals report
• News snippets
  including: Live Text review, Outlook podcast, Caitlin's vlog.
• GLWFL Premier League round-up

Ben's match report
GLWFL Premier division
Academicals 0:13 Orient

Our weekly match report by Ben James from the Douglas Eyre Sports Centre – Walthamstow.

📷 Ben James

Coming off last week’s 12 – nil drubbing of relegation bound Islington Borough at Cheshunt, Orient were the visitors this Sunday to the Walthamstow-based London Academicals at the Douglas Eyre Sports Centre. Prior to the match, the Accies sat seventh in the GLWFL’s Premier Division, safe from relegation; however, they were a whopping 24 points off Orient’s league-topping point tally of 42 and were also on three League game losing patch.

Major changes to Orient’s starting eleven were required as four players who were in last week’s squad – Wiki Fronc, Macie Windsor, Maddie Biggs and Ellie Leek – were absent. A returning Steph McCaffrey helped matters but the O’s were still desperately short in numbers – with Olivia McGregor being the only substitute on coach Jason Stephen’s bench.

From the opening whistle, and as with most of their matches, Orient's immediate press – set the tone. And just like last week, it was captain Grace Gillard who promptly opened the O’s scoring account with a rebound into the back of net two minutes in after the Accies goalie couldn't control a stinging strike from Georgia Griffin.

📷 Ben James

And Orient didn’t have to wait too long for their next goal as Bria Abbiati, starting her second game, slotted home her first for the squad at five minutes. While the action is mostly in the Academicals half, the home team did manage to launch a few long ball attacks towards Orient’s goal. Unfortunately for them, O’s goalkeeper Lola Durojaiye and defender Haley West slammed the door shut to any advances.

📷 Ben James

The Accies first half forays were put to bed when Poppy Binding scored her first at 22 minutes, followed by a series of corners and throw-ins deep in the home side's half. Some great saves from their goalie and desperate defending kept the score to three – nil, but an own goal off a Grace Gillard cross at 35 minutes followed by a lovely low strike by Eva Carvalho at 42 minutes gave Orient a five – nil lead as the referee blew his whistle for half-time.
The start of the second half saw Olivia McGregor come off the bench to replace Eva Carvalho. She quickly got into the action as the match continued to be played mostly deep in the Accies half. More saves from the home side’s goalie along with several Orient strikes hitting the woodwork kept the score as it was until 58 minutes when Poppy Binding collected her second goal though a lovely volley from just outside the box.

📷 Ben James

A minute later, Georgia Griffin scored her first, and just a minute after that, her second. Now at eight – nil and the Accies had officially run out of steam. The onslaught continued as Steph McCaffrey got on the score sheet as did Flo Donnelly. Binding got another, giving her a hat trick, while Donnelly netted a brace. The final goal was Binding’s fourth to give the O’s a 13 – nil victory.

📷 Ben James

To give credit to the Academicals, they knew their match against Orient was not going to go their way and would be lopsided. This did not prevent them from celebrating when they could – including when their goalie made saves, defenders made tackles and when they did press into the O’s half. Their head coach was enthusiastically vocal, offering nothing but encouragement and positivity. He didn’t express frustration, anger or disappointment – only continued praise for his squad. This was wonderful to witness.

But after 90 minutes, it was another convincing Orient victory. As Tooting Bec, the only team with a mathematical chance (but about at the same odds of winning the EuroMillions jackpot) of topping Orient in the table, won away at South London, this means the O’s will have to wait to seal promotion. They can do this in a fortnight against their second-place rivals at Bec’s home at Tooting & Mitcham United FC.

However, Orient’s next encounter is the Capital Women’s Cup final against Hammersmith FC at Dorking. After their FA Cup encounter with AFC Bournemouth, this should be the O’s sternest test of the season. Like with Orient, the higher-tiered Hammersmith have been the class of their division and are in the driver’s seat for promotion – with only one loss and one draw against their 15 victories.
Expect a close match between these two top squads next Sunday – but hopefully a second defeat of the season to Hammersmith!

📷 Ben James

Ben James ✍

Match video

We have some video clips as part of our on-going efforts to bring you good quality video of the women's games. The project is moving along nicely. Click the link to Watch it on YouTube or hit the image of Steph McCaffrey below...

News Snippets

Review of Larry's LIVE-TEXT show
To read the blow-by-blow report sent in from our match correspondent Larry Peterson, click to re-live all the action - as it unfolded - plus some news, as it came in, direct from the touchline.

You can tune in to our LIVE-TEXT broadcasts for all the women's games. There's no sign-in required, we don't leave cookies on your device (ever!) and you won't need to keep refreshing the page to make sure you have the latest info, we do all that automatically. If you can't get to a game, follow along with us - live. We post links to the live-text events on lofcwomen.com a day or so before each match.

Caitlin-talks-football *
Journalist Caitlin Kelly produces video content for most of the Orient women's games.
Caitlin's video from Sunday's game at London Academicals is now available. Here's her Instagram page where she always has some content. Caitlintalksfootball.

Orient Outlook Podcast
If you prefer a brief overview of the match - and have someone read it out for you, look no further than Paul and Steve at Orient Outlook Podcast, staunch supporters of the Orient Women's project. Click the image below to go straight to their "women's update" report in episode 426 about the away Premier League win at London Academicals. No subscriptions or login required.

Sunday's results.

Here are Sunday's results. Four Premier division games:

AFC Croydon failed to move above Sporting Duet in the premier division after a bit of a 6:1 bashing at home from already relegated Islington Borough. A hat-trick from Lucinda Anderson and a brace from top scorer Andrea Chan did the damage.

AFC Leyton are now officially the second relegated club after a 3:1 reversal at home to the ever improving Luton Town Development squad. Luton have pretty much secured a creditable 4th spot, only AFC Croydon can catch them but their form suggests that will not happen.

The big match of the day took place at Griffin sports centre where South London fell to a 1:0 home defeat to the relentless Tooting Bec. The lady with the longest name in football, Daniela F. O. Rodrigues Aguiar, scoring the deciding goal. You'll see from the league table (below), Bec have been the stand-out team of the season if it wasn't for Orient. This has been a freak season and Bec must feel unlucky that a team who should be playing several divisions higher have been shoe-horned into Tier 7. A personal note... Tooting Bec would do very well in Tier 6 and should be playing there next season - however that can be achieved.

The GLWFL Premier division table looks like this.

The league season is 18 games long ....

Next up...

Next Sunday sees the O's ladies play at the Meadowbank stadium, home of Dorking FC, against Hammersmith FC in the season's biggest game in the women's season at County level. A full preview from the pen of Gizmo will be published here on Thursday. We urge everyone to try to make the trip to Dorking to support the Orient. Of course, the LOFCwomen.com crew will be there!