As the excitement builds for our Women’s Under-16s in Professional Game Academy Plate final on Sunday, coach Stella Calderhead wants her young group of players to produce the standard of performances they have seen week in, week out.
Reaching a second consecutive cup final in two years, where we memorably won the PGA Champions Trophy last term, our youngsters will take on Leicester City in the showpiece event at Wheatsheaf Stadium (11am kick-off) - with free admission for supporters.
Impressing week in, week out in their league competition, our Academy side are keen to add silverware in the closing stages of the campaign but, as always, the primary focus at this level is about providing the young players with plenty of experience to prepare them for senior football in years to come - and this weekend’s cup final will be exactly that.
Stella spoke of her excitement ahead of the clash with the Foxes, but insisted that the group are focused on putting in their usual standard of performance.
“We’re all looking forward to it, and we know it will be a special occasion for such a young group of players,” she told us. “I want to hold my excitement behind; it’s more about the girls and what they show in terms of experiencing a cup final.
“We had a few of our players step up to the Under-19s this season, notably in the last few months, and they would have experienced that type of stadium, atmosphere feeling, and were excited about it.
“But it’s more about how they mentally prepare herself for this type of game and rather seeing as a massive, massive game, we want them to just go out there and express themselves on the pitch like it’s a normal league fixture and show what quality they have about them.”
As mentioned above, our Under-16s tasted success in the PGA Champions Trophy last year, beating Blackburn Rovers 6-2 on the day, and a number of players who are expected to feature in Sunday’s final would have been part of that winning side.
Stella is hoping the mixture of first years’ excitement of competing in this special occasion combined with the experienced heads of a number of second years, who competed in last year's cup final, will help their cause on the day.
“We’ve a number of first years who will be competing in a final for the first time with Spurs while some of the second years obviously experienced it last year so, as a group, they all have different experiences,” she added.
“It will be seeing how that all comes together at the weekend and, at the end of the day, it’s up to their performance as a group and as individuals.
“It’s very important as you have all types of different characters, personalities in the group, but as a group, they work really well in terms of how they prepare themselves and how they work as a unit.”