After beating Durham 3-0 on the opening day of the season, Doncaster Rovers Belles completed a league double over the Wildcats on Thursday night with another victory.
Goals from Emily Roberts and Courtney Sweetman-Kirk either side of the half time whistle, were enough to see the Belles move back to the top of the WSL 2 table. However their glory was short-lived as promotion rivals Reading beat Millwall 24 hours later to knock the Belles back in to second.
However Glen Harris will be pleased with a much improved performance from his Rovers side who started the game full of confidence despite losing their first game of the season last time out.
After just 10 minutes Roberts put the league’s front-runners ahead, slotting the ball neatly in the bottom corner after a long-range defence-splitting pass from Kasia Lipka.
Despite their shaky start the hosts did create chances of their own to level the scores with Jordan Atkinson proving the main threat down the wing.
Durham’s defence also seemed to iron out their frailities quickly after the early goal and restricted the Belles to efforts from distance, although the experienced Sue Smith and Bethany England both saw chances like this drift narrowly wide.
The Wildcats continued to press for an equaliser as the game progressed, and were almost gifted one through Belles’ keeper Nicola Hobbs when, under pressure from Courtney Corrie, she miskicked her clearance against the striker and was lucky to see the ball roll out of play.
After the break Durham substitute Jess Clark should have scored with her first touch of the game but just couldn’t quite reach Atkinson’s cross along the face of goal.
The Belles capitalised on their opponents missed opportunities and put the game to bed on 78 minutes when Roberts’ lob hit the post and was turned in by Sweetman-Kirk for her 6th goal of the season.
Speaking to Belles TV after the game, scorer Sweetman-Kirk said: “Durham is not an easy place to come and I’m glad we’ve got the three points and a clean sheet.”
She added: “It’s definitely cleared a few demons from last season and from the weekend and for me it’s a relief to get one in the back of the net.”
