NMJFC U10 Hornets V RNE Blues - Trophy Event - 12/4/25

Game #4 – A repeat of game 3. The Hornets were up against Reddish North End Blues,  who we are becoming a little familiar with and this fixture has always proved to be a very close encounter and Saturday morning was no different. Everything else about this season is new, particularly the ‘Champions League’ format for our Trophy Event. We needed a positive result to put points on the board, top two qualify!

Missing Oliver L & Ollie M for different reasons, the team were down to one sub against a very physical opposition. As coaches, we’ve noticed that most of the teams in our group have decided to play ‘Route One’ football against us since the trophy event was introduced and as a team, we’ve had to sharpen up and stop being so naïve! We were given an early warning in the first few minutes when their goalie went long and the bounce caught out both Oliver B in the middle and Frankie at centre-back. That was the only time they got away with it! Oliver B & Frankie worked in tandem and dealt with the long-ball, the bounce, the second-ball & the flick-on immaculately. The pair of them ran through brick-walls to defend their team and it didn’t go unnoticed by our parents watching. Frankie & Oliver B have never been recognised in the end-of-season ‘Presentation Day’ because they are the coaches-kids but today, both kids made a case to be rewarded for thier ‘Never say die’ displays. They were warriors 💪

We have to include the wide defenders in this too. Finley and Ronan worked their socks off. Both Finners & Rocket were on top-form and you could see how much the importance of this game meant to them both. Amazing strength boys. The pair of them upped their energy levels and got proper stuck in. Never missed a tackle and were lethal on the counter-attack creating opportunities for our forward players to work their magic.. Albie ⚽️ was the beneficiary and slotted home perfectly and The Hornets were Buzzing 🐝  Albie is our ‘Maestro’ and he doesn’t just score goals. He tracks back and puts in very important tackles to help out his defenders. This resulted with him getting an injury and having to come off but he was refusing to give up. We need all of our forward players to adopt this mentality & relentlessness!

Charlie came on and was absolutely brilliant. We requested something different from Charlie today. Be tough, Hold the ball up, Use your skill-set  & believe in yourself! He did it with flying colours.

Kai had a tough first half. It was a very early kick-off and we requested hard-wok & discipline from our toughest-cookie. Discipline in his positional awareness and understanding the importance being available for the final pass. We practice in different formations, to understand what it takes to know ‘The Role’ of each individual position. Second-Half Kai nailed it!! Responsive and more calculated in his decision making. The opposition quite simply couldn’t handle his passion & desire to win the ball!

Special mention to Fenn too. Our superb goalie who is working on his footwork & distribution and was so much more decisive this weekend and was getting the attacks started with a quick ball out-wide. He also had the sun completely in his eyes second half but never made a single mistake.

Two games to go boys….  We’ve got this! If you put in that type of performance for the rest of the season, I promise you, we will be leaving our first season at The Stockport Metro League with a trophy.

POTM went to Oliver B 🏆 our destroyer! He took the role of stopping the long-ball and never shrank… not once! He blocked the ball with every single part of his body and sometimes took the player too. This boy doesn’t try to be glamourous. He understands what is needed in each individual game and adapts. He’s a coaches dream -COS THE BOY THAT LISTENS!

HARD WORK BEATS TALENT, WHEN TALENT DOES’T WORK HARD

C’Mon Hornets – Time to turn the magic on 💛🖤⚽️

⚽️🖤💛⚽️

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