It’s 2023 and halfway through the season for the Portsmouth Force U12 side in their first year of the National League.

Their first game of the year was to be away to Bracknell Cobras at the Bracknell and Wokingham College in Bracknell Town Centre. It was a tough match in their first encounter but working behind the scenes hoped this year was going to bring rewards for the Team.

The 1st quarter was a close contest with both teams being very organised and with an improved Portsmouth Force side working as a team screening well on offence and staying big and strong in defence making it difficult for the home side to break them down. Although Bracknell forced a few penalties they could not capitalise and when the first set of subs came on the score was 4 – 3 in Portsmouth Force's favour. Bracknell continued to press and a few good bits of work by the Bracknell 1,4 and 44 saw them edge forward in the quarter to 15 – 5 but felt it could have gone either way.

The 2 nd quarter continued to be contested well and link-up play from Danny and Michael and two penalties from Freddie Male helped to continue to put points on the board for Portsmouth but Bracknell was staying strong as a unit too. As the quarter was ending the feeling from Head Coach Andy was this was a good game to start the year and the developments were starting to shine through.

In the 3rd and 4th quarters, the teams started with fresh legs and with Portsmouth putting in more points on the board than the home side, but some players had to be cautious too as they had picked up a few fouls along the way, but this also helped them not to dive in and shut out the opposition in a more experienced way. Toby Daraz looped in a marvellous 3-pointer on his 2nd attempt saving him some extra training by Coach Andy and with a good team performance all around and although the Team did not walk away
A win today could hold their heads up high as this match could have gone either way.

Coach Andy summarised the game as the Teams best game of the season and the Team should be very proud of themselves:

We had great defence today, can always work on the attack but after today's match, we have good things to build on.