North Ferriby United Girl’s U10 last week returned from a once in a life time fixture played at Wembley Stadium.
The club were chosen to represent the East Riding at the National Football Festival hosted at Wembley Stadium, an event was organised by The FA and McDonalds to celebrate the Grassroots Community Football Programme. The club were chosen as a result of their achievement of FA Community Club status and for being one of the two clubs which entered the newly formed U8’s Girl’s League in February 2010.
Realising that they would be playing on the Country’s most famous pitch within hours of the England Senior team the club decided to make a trip of it and booked tickets to see the National side play Hungary in an international friendly. The girls had a fantastic evening, returning to their hotel full of excitement at the thought of playing on the hallowed turf the following day.
The next morning the girl’s arrived at Northwick Park beside Wembley Stadium where they visited various coaching areas giving the players the opportunity to learn new skills from sessions led by Eric Harrison, the McDonald’s National Coach and former Manchester United Youth Team Coach, who has coached David Beckham, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes to stardom. In addition the team took part in three tournament matches against teams from across the Country winning all three games 3-0, 3-0 and 5-0 thanks to goals from Evie Barnes-Blondell, Elizabeth Lee, Georgia Edwards, Alice Stewart and Georgia Cook.
Following the festival at Northwick Park the girls made their way to Wembley Stadium, entering the ground via the player’s tunnel, a dream come true for all those present. The girls played one match on the Wembley pitch against Molesley Juniors from Surrey. It was a tough match but the girls finally got a well deserved breakthrough going on to win the match 1-0 after a goal from Evie Barnes-Blondell which I’m sure will never be forgotten.
The girls were lucky enough to meet Michael Owen and Sir Trevor Brooking and posed for a team photograph with Sir Geoff Hurst. The day was capped off perfectly when the girls walked up to the Royal Box to receive a commemorative medal from the guests of honour.
Team photograph from left to right: Anna King, Ruby-Ema Parr, Evie Barnes-Blondell, Georgia Oliver, Alice Stewart, Abbie Thompson, Georgia Cook, Georgia Edwards, Jasmine Lacey and Elizabeth Lee.