Horfield Home, 2nds
16-3 Rachel Knight (4), Gareth Thomas (3), Sian Hunt (3), Josh Cockburn (2), Caroline Lowdon (1), Gwen Jones (1), Magnus Dons (1), Steve Fung (1), Alex Thomas, Pete Obee.
A fine performance from Dragons seconds, who managed to regain some of the fluency they’d shown earlier in the season.
Dragons began by creating lots of chances which just wouldn’t drop, particularly through Caroline and Gwen, but it was Horfield who took the lead with a quick shot from collect. Gwen finally managed to get a reward for regularly beating her marker, as she scored the equaliser, but as Dragons celebrated Horfield executed a very quick changeover to move back in the lead. Sian responded instantly from long range. This prompted the Dragons to take control, Caroline and Gareth both scored runners before Sian completed a hat-trick. Gareth then finished off another running-in shot neatly from under the basket to give Dragons a 7-2 lead at the half.
It took a while for Dragons to find their feet in the second half, but a quick move from Magnus saw him find the basket from close in. Unfortunately soon afterwards he got an (inadvertent) finger in his eye and had to be replaced by Josh, though there was no long term damage. Back on court, Rachel who had replaced Sian burst through for a running-in shot, then Steve opened his account with a penalty.
Dragons were now scoring with some rapidity, Josh benefitted from assists from Caroline and a neat side feed from Gareth added a rapid brace of running-in shots, then Rachel scored twice at the other end. Horfield did manage a response, but Gareth grabbed his first ever hat-trick (in only his 5th game)�before Rachel finished the scoring from long range.