In the final showdown of the hockey season, the Ladies 4s clashed with Bishops Stortford in a riveting encounter at the badger field. Despite a valiant effort, the Badgers faced a disappointing 5-3 defeat against the visiting team in what proved to be a high-scoring affair.

From the opening whistle, both sides showcased their attacking prowess, setting the stage for a thrilling match. Bishops Stortford gained an early advantage, dominating the first half. Broxbourne’s first goal came when Zara found the back of the net from a short corner, offering a glimmer of hope to the home side. The score was 3-1 to the opposition at half time.

However, the Badgers refused to concede defeat, rallying together with commendable teamwork and unwavering determination.

As the second half unfolded, Broxbourne intensified their offensive efforts, determined to turn the tide in their favor. Their perseverance paid off as Callia and Annie delivered sensational goals, igniting the crowd with excitement and narrowing the scoreline.

Despite their gallant efforts, the Badgers ultimately fell short, unable to overturn the early lead established by Bishops Stortford. Nevertheless, Broxbourne can take pride in their remarkable season, with Lisa leading the team with grace and determination as captain.

The Ladies 4s topped the charts in the Ladies section of the club, showcasing their talent and commitment on the field. With their eyes set on the future, the team eagerly anticipates the challenges and triumphs that lie ahead in the upcoming season.

As the final whistle echoed across the pitch, both teams exchanged handshakes and congratulations, acknowledging the hard-fought battle that unfolded. While the result may not have favored the Badgers on this occasion, their resilience and unity serve as a testament to their character and fortitude as a team.

Mens 1s vs Bury St Edmunds 1 - 3-2 win

Saturday brought around the final game of the season for the men’s first 11. After dropping points away to the Bury St Edmund side following a well earned Christmas break, it was important for the team to finish the season on a high and claim 3 points.

Following a confusing warm up with half the team claiming to be George, the team prepared for the start as the dark grey clouds tumbled over the badger den. The umpires blew for the start of the game and the heavens opened. Thrashing sharp, cold golf ball sized shards of ice over the players and pitch. The onslaught of ice bamboozled the umpires into thinking it was a pleasant day for a game of hockey so play resumed.

The conditions made it difficult for the game. Running was impossible, passing was difficult and the players in disarray as play continued. The Bury side, too concerned about joining the second team in the league below, were too worried to care about the game allowing some slick play through the middle to fall to Toby House. Toby cleverly flicked the ball through the defensive line to prolific goal scorer Sam Groves, who as clean as you like, slotted the ball through the keepers legs to make it 1-0. After the goal, Broxbourne piled on the pressure further allowing chances to go begging. Until the mighty George Blemkin waltzed into the d and took a thunderous strike towards goal. But again the killer instincts of Groves took hold of the matter and rifled the ball into the corner with a huge deflection dazing the keeper.

With the game at 2-0 Broxbourne felt comfortable. Maybe a little too comfortable. The bury side spurred on by their impending demotion attacked Broxbourne hard earning a short corner. They made no mistake in sensing Broxbourne’s quivering hands and slotted the ball into the bottom right hand corner. The blame for this was passed around the bar all night but I won’t say by who…

The second half game and Broxbourne were looking to finish their season on a high, playing for the supporters who had willed the hail away and the sun was back out defrosting the pitch. Sam missed 2 flicks. The badgers pressed hard in the second half to extend the lead to 3-1. Toby House found himself in the D with his first shot saved by the keeper but he made no mistake in scoring the second opportunity with a goal ripping half volley straight past the keeper. As play was nearing the end for the last time of the season Bury had one fight left in them. With a ball across the D and a clinical deflection, the pressure was on and the men had to firm it out for the win. The game culminated in a 3-2 win for the badgers sending bury into the league below and Broxbourne up Into the league above.

Well done, Champions.

Ladies 1s vs Cambridge City 3 - 3-2 loss

After an interesting trip last week up to “tractor town” as Lara would call it, the Badgers were back on home turf where everyone drives around in cars. Hoping for a 3 pointer the badgers arrived in the changing rooms already wet from the hail during the men’s match. While everyone else was changing into their dry match kit and Lisa was deciding whether to put on some dry underpants or not Meg was told to do space buns. However, she was not prepared to ruin her slick back which took her the whole morning to do. Instead she took the inevitable donkey vote. Lara was not happy with this decision as she didn’t want to wear space buns by herself. Luckily Gem and Freya joined her becoming a cute littler trio.

After all that we decided it would be best if we started to warm up, but Freya had other plans. Her cat qualities shon through as unlike any other dog she refused to run and as a result was very mad at the team.

Later on, the match began. The badgers became 1-0 down but that wasn’t a problem. We quickly won a short corner and Em scored a rocket. The badgers kept dominating the game before they finally won another short corner that they deserved. The half time whistle was blown just after so the whole team was up. Cambridge were clearly intimidated by the whole teams pom poms as Willsy deflected a cracking ball from Cat into the back of the net. The half time hail storm then appeared out of no where which brought bad luck upon the badgers. Even though the badgers were clearly the better team, Cambridge equalised and then scored the winning goal. In the last 15 minutes the badgers were hungry for another goal. Wonderful hockey was played but unfortunately it didn’t go our way.

As the final whistle blew Cambridge celebrated their safety from relegation like they had won the world cup. To portray her frustration at the loss, Tor decided to dress up like Trash.

Away Fixtures

Ladies 2s vs St Albans 4 - 5-4 win

The ladies 2s headed to Oaklands college for their final game of the season against St Albans 4. On the home fixture earlier on in the year, the baguettes secured a 4-1 win. Positive mindsets all around going into the game.

Before the game had begun, there were a few spanners throw - Captain Millie was stuck at Heathrow airport waiting for her luggage, Hannah was thankfully released from Holloway Women’s prison just in time for the game with a new hair do and Vic got stressed over the new Oaklands college entrance (classic Geek Barbie). Who knew a lambing event could result in so much chaos.

With defender Grace out for the game turning her efforts to head coach for the day and almost all players assembled, the game began.

The baguettes started well with some clinical play, resulting in an early goal in the first minute from Beth. Off to a flying start from Airhostess Barbie.

Queue the arrival of returning traveller Ali Deol, who was dressed in her waviest garms in preparation for hippy Barbie that evening.

Cut to 5 minutes later where we won a short corner. A deceptively slow straight strike by Vic (all part of the plan) took the keeper by surprise and hit the back left corner of the goal. 2-0 and a 100% short corner conversion rate (so far). Another goal from Vic followed shortly after with a lift over the keeper. St Albans brought the score to 3-1 just before the break.

Captain Millie appeared fresh from the runway and the team was finally complete. The second half was less of a stellar performance from the Baguettes but some notable events to report include:
- The umpires being card happy
- Lyds losing her stick on multiple occasions
- Beth scoring a second goal
- Vic kicking her hattrick chance
- Kelly getting her second goal of the season
- Lily being decked at the final whistle and perhaps realising playing with broken ribs wasn’t a good idea ?
- Despite doing our usual “let the oppo score goals in the second half and beat us at the last minute” we managed to hold onto the win 5-4!

Vic’s excitement about Ali’s return was soon rescinded when photo evidence of her enjoying a McDonalds on the pitch surfaced, resulting in the majority of donkey votes. Close calls for Hannah for flooring a SA player (we knew there was a reason she served her prison sentence for GBH), Jess for being flattened by a SA defenders booty and Lily for kicking the ball into Sue which thankfully didn’t end as badly as Grace’s face last week. Meg won the coveted player votes for another great game in defence.

Lots of the team headed back to the club to enjoy the Men’s and Ladies 1s fixtures, apart from Hannah who thought she was going for cake and tea…. Mishearing Dan that they were in fact going to TK Maxx.

A big thanks to our week in week out travelling supporters this season - the Jennings, the Hawthornes and resident ball boy Batman.

A fab way to end the season. Finishing a respectable 10th out of 12 in the league and securing no relegation, the Barbies ‘danced the night away’ at the BHC social to celebrate!

Ladies 3s vs Chiltern 1 - 2-1 win

Ladies 3s pull it out the bag.

The Ladies 3’s were entering the final week of the season under quite a bit of pressure after failing to bag some much needed points last week. It was left to the final game of the season to see if they would remain in their current league or face relegation. Unfortunately for them, the team they were playing were also in the same position so it was a case of battling it out.

The team themselves were fully aware of the situation they were facing, well all except Kirsty, who on the morning of the match, thought she’d break the news to the team after a significant absence for the last month or so and received much deserved sarcastic responses!!!

Upon arriving in Luton, the team took their sweet time finding the changing rooms but celebrated doing so through Tara presenting some adult jelly sweets in honour of Hannah’s Hen celebration, which would be taking place later in the day.

The game started well for Broxbourne, but they were put off by the lack of goalkeeper from the opposition, which left them overloaded on the pitch at times and unable to get past a five player defence.

In what can only be described as quite a fractious first half, Broxbourne unfortunately found themselves one nil down as a result of a break by Chiltern. For a large part of the first half, Broxbourne were frustrated by some unfortunate calls and a disallowed flick, which did appear to be taken within the rules but was cancelled out.

Broxbourne did manage to rise above the tension with a strong midfield performance from Kirsty, Laura, Freya and Roisin and some great runs from Hannah, Brawny, Fixter and Cerys to carry the ball into the attacking end, winning several short corners and successfully finding an equaliser via Freya, who slotted it home from a short corner to keep it even at the break.

The second half saw dominance from Broxbourne, who had ample opportunities, however were denied by some great saves off the line by the Chiltern defenders.

The deadlock was finally broken with a much sought after goal from Brawny (it only took till the last game for her to score but what a time to do it!). The momentous occasion was almost caught on camera, only for Captain Hannah to later reveal that she’d accidentally taken a photo instead!

For the remainder of the game, Chiltern’s breaks were dealt with well by the defence (no aggressive remarks this week from Lauren and noticeably more running from Tors, who had come home early from a work night out to ensure she could function for an early match). Tara delivered some perfectly timed tackles to stop the attackers in their tracks and distribute the ball away from the defensive D. Alisha made some vital saves in the final stages to deny the opposition their chance to take the win and stood firm against some solid shots.

With a subsequent hailstorm descending on the players for what felt like an eternity, the final whistle blew and Broxbourne took the win and saved themselves.

They set the mood for the evening celebrations as Captain Hannah celebrated her last match before she got married with a win!

Player of the match went to Tara for her solid defending throughout the game

Donkey of the match went to Tors for accidentally revealing the ‘surprise’ fancy dress theme for the evening (though Cerys did come a close second for forgetting her astros)

The team would like to take this final match report to thank all those who have supported them during this season:

To our coaches, Matt and Josh, thank you for putting up with all our moaning, and being a great support to us. Your patience with us has made a difference and definitely had an impact (even if some games it doesn’t seem so).

To the numerous players who have stepped in to help us out on weeks where we’ve needed extra players, you’ve been invaluable.

To the other captains, who have worked with Hannah to field five ladies teams on a weekly basis.

And finally, to our Club Captain Em, who has supported us tirelessly and led the ladies section superbly. We appreciate all your hard work and now the season has ended wish you a restful summer as you handover the reins.

Mens 2s vs Blueharts 3 - 3-1 win

What a way to end the season,
The 2s started strong and showed that they should be the winners of the league, with a few missed chances early on we managed to score with an own goal coming from a great run from Baller that ended up in the back of the net off of the opposing teams stick, with a winning lead and the whole team wanting 8 goals to get to 100 for the season you could see we was goal hungry, after a little while we managed another due to a miss hit from sully falling to to Bobby in the d that got placed into the bottom corner, soon after we won a P flick that satwick our man of the match was keen to take and rightly so after he slotted it past the keeper to make it 3-0, considering we had to stop play due to the hail stones and our veteran brownie couldn’t see past his nose we took a short break but was soon back too bossing the game ,
After half time it’s fair to say we didn’t play our best hockey and in the last 2 mins of the game we managed to concede a goal but we didn’t let our heads drop and we soldiered on, with a 3-1 win to end the season it’s safe to say we’ve earned our place in the league above and are excited for the more competitive games ahead, all in all we played solid and did what we needed to do
On to the new season with bigger and better things to come!

Ladies 5s vs St Albans 8 - 4-0 loss

We were away to St Albans for our last game of the season. Having our worst result last week meant that we needed to dig deep to ensure that we went into this game positively.

The game started well and it was looking like we were in for a good match. However, St Albans upped the tempo and, with a couple of skilful players through the middle, they were able to capitalise by stringing together some nice passes.

However, the Brox team really pulled together as a team. We’ve really come along way this season and, unfortunately, the score line for the last 2 games has really not reflected how well we have played in the second half of the season. This week saw much better use of the width of the pitch, some lovely passing and some great tenacity in the D. But, things weren’t to be for us this week.

The game also saw our first penalty flick which Daniela stepped up to take, unfortunately being saved by the St Albans keeper. Isla also took a nasty ball to the mouth - luckily it was her lip that took the force (and that she was wearing her gum shield!) We hope that you’re OK. It also saw our first green card – Ivy being the offender…(and also a close call for Teagan). The crime – going in for a tackle without backing off ‘5’ after committing the original foul. You could argue that we’re passionate…

The depth of quality was reflected in the player votes with Teagan, Ivy, Chloe, Jess, Katie and Dan getting votes. However, Sarah G took it this week for some great play and interceptions in midfield – well done Sarah!

Well done to everyone who has played this season – it’s been testing at times and you’ve all shown great commitment to the team. This has been shown by the amount of people coming to practice and the consistency of the teams that we have fielded. We look forward to welcoming some new players next year that have been coming to practice recently.

Hoping to see many of you in Summer League!

Mens 4s vs Saffron Walden 7 - 5-0 win (walkover)
Saffron Walden forfeited this fixture.

Sunday 24th March

Away Fixtures

Ladies 1s vs Cambridge University 1 - 4-0 loss
Match report pending.

...And that concludes the 2023/24 season!
A big thank you to all our captains and match report writers this season for allowing us to produce the round up each week.

We celebrated with our BHC social on Saturday evening with over 80 club members in fancy dress at the club. Another big well done to the Mens 1s and 2s for both securing promotion, and to other teams for retaining their place in their leagues.

See you all at the Badger Ball to round off the season in style. Tickets still available at £38 per person.