📝 Report: Southampton Women 1-0 Bristol City Women (AET)

Match Report sponsor: UWE Bristol

Image credit: Isabelle Field/SFC

🧐 BACKGROUND

City Women travelled to St Mary’s looking to get back to winning ways after back-to-back defeats at the hands of Manchester City and Charlton Athletic. 

Lauren Smith made three changes to the starting XI which saw Melissa Johnson, Gwen Davies and Izzy Cook come in.

The Robins were facing a Saints side full of confidence after an eight-game unbeaten run coming into Sunday’s FA Cup fixture. 

✍️ WHAT HAPPENED?

As action got underway on the south coast it was evident to see Saints were up for the challenge in front of a strong home crowd. 

The Robins made a cagey start to proceedings as Satara Murray twice had to come to the rescue in the 18-yard-box to deny Caitlin Morris and Lucia Kendall. 

As the first half developedCity grew in confidence and began to spread the ball across the width of the pitch and stretch their opponents. 

First, Brooke Aspin’s looping header bounced off the top of the crossbar which was followed by back-to-back efforts from Johnson, who failed to trouble Kayla Rendell in the Saints net. 

Abi Harrison then lashed a half-valley past the target after neat interplay on the right wing between the striker, Ffion Morgan and the accompanying Johnson. 

Murray then tested the shot-stopper late on in the first period as she hooked the ball towards the bottom corner, where Rendell was again on hand to tip the ball round the post to see the sides head into the changing rooms locked up at 0-0. 

⏱ HALF-TIME

City began the second half with a renewed energy and earned themselves two big chances within the first five minutes of play. 

No less than a minute after the restart Gwen Davies shifted the ball on her left foot on the edge of the box and smashed her effort off the base of the post. 

Johnson would then have a glorious opportunity to bag an opener as she hared through on goal, seeming to breeze past Rosanna Parnell but Rendell remained tall in the one-on-one to deny the forward. 

Kendall almost puts the hosts ahead on the 75-minute mark as a mix up at the back saw Fran Bentley hoist a clearance high into the sky and Kendall acrobatically turned the ball towards goal. Luckily for City it was wide of the target. 

With the game seemingly set for extra-time City had one final roll of the dice as substitutes Ava Kuyken and Aggie Beever-Jones combined to see the latter poke the ball past the onrushing Rendell. However, Milly Mott was alert to the danger and cleared the ball off the line with minutes left to play. 

⌚️EXTRA-TIME

The two sides were in deadlock after the 90, which meant a 30-minute period of extra-time would be played and Southampton wasted no time in setting out their stall.

Ella Morris drifted off her marker at the far post to connect with Ella Pusey’s ball into the box and hand the Saints the advantage just one minute into extra-time.

City were then awarded a penalty in the second half of extra-time when Beever-Jones was tripped in the area. Jesse Woolley stepped up to take the spot-kick, but blazed her effort over the bar. 

Saints held out for the remainder of the game to claim a fourth round scalp and advance to the last sixteen of the competition.