Linnets Ladies keep their shooting boots on as they fire home 14

Runcorn Linnets Ladies 14

Chester City Ladies 0 RUNCORN Linnets Ladies jumped to second place in the Cheshire Women’s Premier Division – three points behind leaders Stockport County – with a resounding win at the Millbank Linnets Stadium on Sunday.

Credit goes to the Chester players and manager Wayne Grest. Hit by injuries, the visitors arrived with just 10 fit players for the game.

Linnets, having earlier in the month triumphed 16-0 against Wythenshawe Amateurs, soon set out their stall. Tempany Carlson hit the inside of a post before the home side took the lead on six minutes. Tish Collins’s header found Lile Ashley to score from the edge of the box.

Two minutes later, it was 2-0. Good interchange football, involving Chelsea Gillies, set up Ashley’s second.

Chester continued to play football and made a few runs into the Runcorn half, but the Linnets’ back line remained solid and compact.

Runcorn’s midfield of Becky Barker, player-of-the-match Mandy Kennedy and Gillies gave the visitors nothing.

On 16 minutes, Gillies made it 3-0 by holding the line well, when beating the offside trap, to latch on to a Becky Barker pass.

Ashley completed a 17th-minute hat-trick off a Gillies through-ball.

Barker (21 minutes) connected with Gabby Evans’s pass for a stunning right-foot finish from the left of the box. Ashley added her fourth and the home side’s sixth in the 25th minute, Gillies again the provider before herself making it 7-0 with 29 minutes on the clock Gillies.

Chester, for all their efforts, could not retain the ball for long periods but galvanised somewhat, they prevented any further home scoring before the break. With the game already won, manager John Pickering made four changes for the second half.

Megan Pickering made her first and only save, palming the ball away. Runcorn, getting back up to speed, made it 8-0 in the 51st minute. The impressive Ellie Isherwood, with a nice turn and drive at the visitors’ back line, slipped in a weighted pass for Marcia JonesSacharewicz to finish neatly.

A minute later, Isherwood’s lofted pass helped Barker to add her second. Pickering was replaced in goal by Collins before later resuming at left back – further proof of the specialist striker’s versatility.

Gillies’s hat-trick was sealed in the 58th minute for 10-0, the goal engineered by Barker.

Gillies’s fourth followed in the 62nd minute, from good pass and move football involving Kennedy.

Jones-Sacharewicz, pressing the visitors on the edge of their 18-yard area, capitalised on a loose ball with an excellent low drive.

She became the third hat-trick scorer in the 73rd minute - Hughes having released Isherwood on the right for the tricky winger to cross.

The woodwork saved Chester three times more in quick succession, but City had a penalty claim waved away after a hefty challenge from behind.

The 14th and final goal, in the 83rd minute, saw Isherwood making her fourth assist of the half and JonesSacharewicz converting her fourth of the afternoon. Linnets’ manager John Pickering intends to further increase competition for places with two or three new signings in the coming weeks.