Spurs Ladies suffered their second league defeat of the season as Durham Women ran out 6-1 winners in a game which also saw both sides reduced to 10 players, writes Rosie Bonass.
The Lilywhites had already fallen behind to Emily Roberts’ goal before goalkeeper Chloe Morgan was shown a straight red card, leaving the home side one player short with over 70 minutes remaining.
Beth Hepple (2), Sarah Robson, Zoe Ness and Chloe Ryan came up with the other goals to hand the visitors an applaudable victory at Cheshunt FC.
Angela Addison had pulled one back for Spurs in the second half before Becky Salicki was sent walking for the Wildcats following a second bookable offence.
The defeat sees the Lilywhites move down to fourth in the FA Women’s Championship, although they have a game in hand on Charlton Athletic and Durham who sit above them in second and third place.
Striker Rianna Dean returned to Karen Hills’ starting line-up after she was absent with concussion for the win against rivals Charlton.
Spurs were trailing with nine minutes played after Roberts fired the ball past Morgan into the bottom corner.
Eight minutes later Morgan received a straight red card for handling the ball outside the penalty area as she attempted to clear an effort on goal from Nicki Gears.
It went from bad to worse for Spurs moments later when the resulting free-kick was blasted into the top right corner by Hepple to double the visitors’ lead.
Hepple got her second goal of the game 10 minutes after to give the Wildcats a 3-0 advantage, leaving Spurs with a mountain to climb going into the break.
Within two minutes of the start of the second half, Robson scored a fourth goal for Durham as she poked home the ball from close range following a free-kick, before Ness made it 5-0 a minute later.
Addison scored a consolation goal for the home side with a looping effort into the top right corner in the 53rd minute which Salicki handled while attempting to clear, leading to a second yellow card as each team were left with 10 players.
Ryan scored the visitors’ sixth goal in injury time as Spurs were left heavily defeated by a clinical Durham side.
Manager Karen Hills was disappointed with the result and admitted that it was hard to recover after going 3-0 down before half-time.
“We knew it was going to be a tough game and I think we cost ourselves a couple of goals in the first half and credit to them - they finished well,” she said.
“It’s always going to be an uphill challenge in the second half when you are 3-0 down and we came out in the second half and gifted them two goals, giving us a mountain to climb.
“The players stuck with it and created opportunities – it was just one of those days, football is sometimes a cruel game.
“We have another game on Wednesday so it gives us an opportunity to try and put things right sooner rather than later so we won’t dwell on it and we’ll get back in training and work hard as we always do, and look to get the performance right on Wednesday.”
Spurs make the short trip to London Bees in the FA Women's Continental Tyres Cup at The Hive, Edgware (London HA8 6AG) on Wednesday night (8pm).
