After promotion, a cup win and four victories over their local rivals last season, Leeds Uni women’s lacrosse 1st team picked up where they left off on Wednesday with a 22-6 thrashing of Leeds Beckett.

The game started fairly evenly. George Single opened the scoring for Uni, but the hosts were pegged back immediately by Beckett. Three more goals soon followed for Uni though, and the side began to pull away.

Beckett’s game plan seemed to be to soak up the Uni pressure and break quickly in attack, but this was too simple for a Uni side that was impressively clinical up front and resilient in defence. Beckett were unlucky to hit the post after a fine move, but were punished with two more goals as captain Lucy Yates got on the score sheet.

After a brief time out Uni picked up where they left off, netting six more times before the halfway point. The pick of the goals came from Caitlin Baty, whose superb solo run from the draw was rounded off with a fine finish.

There seemed to be no way back for Beckett in the second half with Uni comfortably ahead at 12-1, but the visitors enjoyed a mini revival after the break, adding four more points to their tally before the time out. This wasn’t enough for Beckett though, as Uni also added four points during the same period.

Any hopes of a Beckett comeback were dashed in the final period of the match, as Baty and Single both contributed to a late flurry of goals for Uni, leaving the final score 22-6 to the hosts.

Captain Lucy Yates was delighted with the result and the performance, ‘It was great for the first time to play together, it was great to get some of the Freshers involved with it. We tried out some of our plays, and we’ve got work to do but it’s a great start to the season so we’re really happy. ‘We’ve just been promoted to the Prem; we’ve got a great team so we’re hoping to do really well this season.’

 

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