Baird Sings Praises of Womens Football Development within National League competitive structure
With tactical skills added to technical skills, the games in the FA’s Women’s National League are improving leaps and bounds, something that has not gone unnoticed by Head of the Programme, James Baird.
Some of the early games were definitely one sided, but recently as the determination and desire of the players has increased, a fact that is aided by the support being shown for the growth of the sport by the FA, as well as a growing band of fully qualified Coaches and Administrators.
According to Baird, who is also Senior Women’s Coach among other roles including Development and Age Group coaching responsibilities, something that he is very please to witness first hand “I’ve been to many games” he confirmed “and what I like so far is there is lots of competition and the girls are having fun. Teams are also beginning to establish themselves, play within systems and generally looking to improve. Players are starting to understand positional play, you can see they have all been working hard during training and there are now obvious leaders on the park.”
In terms of the league itself, VG United are emulating their men’s team with a table topping performance so far, despite going down 2-1 to local rivals, Avengers FC, who sit in third place, in the Crosstown Derby last weekend.
“The women are coming out in great numbers. We have a lot of younger girls showing much more interest in the sport. The first round of 7 aside toughened the younger girls for the 9×9. They are improving with each practice session which is exhibited during the games. We are now working on strengthening, coordination and positioning. Very grateful for BVIFA to re introduce soccer games/league for the women.”
The Avengers victory was inspired by Lil Makeda Fahie who kept her cool to slot home the winner from the penalty spot in the 54th minute. This came after Te’Zahria Noble of VGU had cancelled out Chesisie Dyers 4th minute opener.
Chasing VG Utd are Wolues FC, who had goals from Zolita Bamford and Eva Carey to thank for a 2-0 win against Positive FC.
Despite being shorthanded, the performance of the Positive Players also drew praise from Baird “Yes, Positive were a couple of players light, but they really were well organized and kept Wolues at bay for long parts of the game. What impressed me is that there is obvious preparation going on and teams will soon be ready for the next step which is eleven a side.
Baird has also seen a lot of young players mixing with the senior players and that only bodes well for the development of National Teams.“I hope this continues and I am delighted by what I’m seeing so far” beamed Baird, who also confirmed that the cadre of Coaches and Administrators was growing and there was definitely a passion being sewn, not only on the field with increased numbers but also now off it in terms of qualified support structures.