Dav Doone felt the Belles were made to work hard for their win as they progressed through to the quarter final of the Sheffield and Hallamshire County Cup on Sunday.
Nadia Khan’s goal on nine minutes was all the Belles needed to overcome stern opposition in AFC Doncaster at the Keepmoat Stadium, and Doone was quick to give the Belles’ opponents credit for making it the game it was.
“I’m pleased for the girls, they deserved that, defensively we looked solid, they had a lot more final third entries than we would have liked but we held firm and managed to see it out for the win,” he said.
“Credit to AFC Doncaster, they made it into a real entertaining derby game, they showed some really good composure on the ball, they set up well defensively themselves and they gave our front two a lot to think about.
“They had to try and lose their marker as much as they could, they made it very difficult for us, it was a real battle, but we’re coming away from it really happy that we held out for the win in the end.”
Sunday’s win over AFC Doncaster was the Belles’ final game of 2019, and Doone feels the way they have ended the year can help them build momentum as they head into 2020.
“Lily Wishart’s hit the post three times on her own, Tori Thomas has also struck the woodwork, the win is so important, we wanted to make it a little more comfortable and get a couple more goals on the board but we’ve ended the year well,” he added.
“We can all look back and be really pleased, we’ve ended the year two undefeated, now we’re really excited and raring to go for when we play Leafield away in January, we want to climb up the league as quickly as we can.
“We want to build on the quality we have shown over the last two weeks, getting three points when we return to league action is vital for us, once you start getting those runs together, we can really look to kick on.”