Fylde Women look forward to returning home

Both of Fylde’s home games so far in the Women’s National Northern Premier Division were played at AFC Fylde’s Mill Farm stadium and resulted in victories over West Bromwich Albion and Burnley.

The temporary move was enforced by a spate of vandalism at the club’s Wesham base but joint-manager Kim Turner is looking forward to the return home this weekend.

She told The Gazette: “KP has had its little refurb and is ready for us to return. It’s a safe environment but, most importantly, it’s our home.

“We’re proud to be one of the few teams in our league who have their own ground which they don’t share.

“It’s been good to play at Mill Farm with the crowd behind us. We have a good game for the return to KP this weekend, and hopefully the fantastic support we had at Mill Farm will be repeated at KP.”

The visitors for Sunday’s 2pm kick-off are a Hull City side who are yet to win this season and went down 6-0 to leaders Nottingham Forest a week ago.

Forest are one of three teams leading the way with 10 points from four games to date with Fylde and Wolves are the others, both dropping their first points when they played out last weekend’s goalless draw in the Midlands.

It was an unlikely result between two free-scoring sides but Turner could take satisfaction from a third clean sheet in this season’s four outings.

She added: “It was a game neither side wanted to lose but we did go on the attack and had multiple chances we didn’t take.

“There were some tired legs after three games in a week but it was an exciting, end-to-end game.

“Wolves came into it in the last 10 minutes of the first half and started the second half strongly.

“But we stood up strong and Khiara (Keating, Fylde’s on-loan goalkeeper from Manchester City) made two cracking saves, one of them to keep the ball out of the top corner. It was a great performance from such a young keeper.”

A new-look Fylde side took the league by storm last season, climbing to second in the table and losing only once at Sunderland before the competition was cancelled due to Covid-19.

They have already proved that was no one-off with 10 points from a possible 12 this term, much to Turner’s delight.

She added: “We’re incredibly proud to keep our unbeaten run going.

“We said we wanted nine points from the first three games, which we got.

“The main thing was not to be beaten and to keep clean sheets, which we’ve achieved as well.

“We’ve had another positive week and the nice thing is that everyone has been really excited to be back on the training ground.

“They want to put the things right that we didn’t do so well at Wolves and that’s really pleasing.”

A Hull side who have conceded 13 goals in three games may not be as tough a nut to crack as a Wolves team yet to see their defences breached in 2021/22.

However, Turner will take nothing for granted, adding: “We know it’s a game we’ll be expected to win but any victory will have to be earned.

“I just want to see us being happy on the ball again after a tough game last weekend.

“We have a few little injury niggles but we’ll have 20 players to choose from and we’re just looking forward to being back on our pitch again.”

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