Dalton’s dream teams: Simply the best

Part two of Sent Her Forward’s look back at the players who have most impressed and made me smile in best part of six years of reporting on women’s football

Deanna Cooper (centre) and Jay Blackie (right), two of the finest footballers I’ve seen, make both my first XIs (Photo: Kevin Richards)

I must have seen at least a dozen of those who took part in this summer’s Women’s World Cup in live club games.

Yet my selections for my Best Ever Team represent a footballing universe far broader than the game’s top global competition – or even just the Women’s Super League.

Dalton’s dream teams: A few of my favourite things

A walk down Memory Lane as Sent Her Forward recalls some of the finest players I’ve had the privilege of watching

Leigh Farley scored the first goal I ever saw live in women’s football – but she did far more than that (Photo: Dave Burt)

It’s almost seven years since I began watching women’s football – and nearly six since I started reporting on it on Sent Her Forward.

Time for a list or two, I think.

Pompey star Hillier bows out with ultimate club accolade

Hillier led Portsmouth Ladies in their first ever game at Fratton Park in December 2013 (Photo: Jordan Hampton)

For a footballer who means so much to a club, Gemma Hillier’s retirement from Portsmouth, the team she has represented for more than 17 years, was a rather ill-fitting anti-climax.

Goal glut reveals gulf between Super League hopefuls and rest of Premier League

Round-up of today’s Premier League action

Portsmouth gained revenge for their defeat at Lewes earlier in the season (Photo: James Prickett)

The gulf between the ambitious Premier League sides still craving a Super League future and the rest was illustrated emphatically in today’s crazy scores in the league’s Southern division.

That old familiar feeling as friends reunited cancel each other out

Portsmouth succumbed to a late goal for the second game in succession (Photo: James Boyes)

Lewes 1 (Carter 87)
Portsmouth 0

Familiarity  may breed contempt, but it can also breed football stalemates – and that was the perhaps inevitable outcome at the Dripping Pan today as a host of former team-mates marked each other out of a disappointingly scrappy game.

Charlton seal clean sweep against Pompey as they tune up for cup finals

Manager Riteesh Mishra wants Charlton to treat every remaining game this season as a cup final (Photo: Jordan Hampton)

Portsmouth 0
Charlton Athletic 3 (Sullivan 20; Dixson 24; Graham 79)

Charlton Athletic limbered up for a month of cup finals with a straightforward victory over an enthusiastic and committed – but inexperienced – Portsmouth side who must be sick of the sight of them by now.

Portsmouth Ladies sign formal deal with men’s club

Mick Williams (left) and Mark Catlin, pictured with Portsmouth commercial director Anna Mitchell, both emphasised the importance of being part of the “Pompey family”

While West Ham United were, some might say, being shamed into taking over the women’s team that bear their name and Lewes were talking about equal budgets for their men’s and women’s senior sides, Portsmouth Ladies chairman Mick Williams was quietly going into bat for the club he holds so dear to his heart.

Lewes director wants level playing field for men and women

Under a Lewes director’s plans, the women’s team would have the same budget as the men’s

Stephen Hunt’s public exposé of West Ham United’s lack of support for the women’s team that plays in the club’s name may – or may not – have done the Hammers Ladies a big favour.

The directors’ swift decision to take the autonomous – but related – club formally into the ample bosom of the West Ham family after being reported to the FA by West Ham Ladies’ chairman for alleged equality rules breaches, needs now to be followed by tangible, measurable commitment, as well as nice words, if the team are to reap the benefits.

Fulgence brace helps Portsmouth to the double over Lewes

Lisa Fulgence made maximum use of the little possession she had to fire Portsmouth to victory over Lewes (Photo: James Boyes)

Lewes 1 (Carter 28)
Portsmouth 2 (Fulgence 47, 57)

Poacher supreme Lisa Fulgence came out on top in the big Brighton reunion with two second-half goals that might just help turn her temporary club’s season around.

Ambitious Chichester City pull off another coup as Wilson joins Green revolution

Sent Her Forward exclusive

Wilson scored 16 goals for Portsmouth in her last full Premier League season in 2014/15 (Photo: Jordan Hampton)

Chichester City have made another stunning capture, adding former Portsmouth striker Charley Wilson-Blakely to a team already bulging with Premier League talent.

The ambitious Premier League South West Division One leaders have transformed their squad – which finished second last season – signing a host of players with Premier League top-flight experience.