Girls’ fightback wins European semi-final place
11th July 2013England’s girls staged a great singles fightback to beat Italy and win through to the semi-finals of the European girls’ team championship at Linköpings, Sweden.
They bounced back from defeat in both foursomes to win four out of the five singles. Now they will play France tomorrow, while the other semi-final is contested by Spain and Sweden.
England coach Scott Godfrey commented: “We’ve had a fantastic day and the girls are over the moon. Italy really wanted to win this championship and they had a very strong team.”
He added: “We were a bit disappointed by the foursomes but we knew we were playing well and we felt we could go out and give it a good go – and we did!”
He added: “We’re really looking forward to getting back out there. The girls are on a bit of a high at the moment and we’re enjoying it, but tomorrow we’ll draw a line under it and get stuck in to another good game.”
Amber Ratcliffe led the way in the singles and was quickly up in her match and stayed in control throughout. Sophie Madden held her nerve to win on the 18th, despite a determined challenge from her opponent over the closing holes.
Sophie Lamb faced possibly the toughest player on the Italian team. She played well but was unable to recover fully from a slow start and bowed out 2/1.
Olivia Winning was neck and neck with her opponent over the outward half but enjoyed a good run on the back nine as she played her way to a win on the 17th. Gabriella Cowley was in another tight game and was one down after 10, but with the help of some impressive birdies closed out her opponent 2/1.
Results
Foursomes
Amber Ratcliffe (Royal Cromer) & Sophie Madden (West Essex) lost to Roberta Liti & Camilla Mortigliengo 2 down
Gabriella Cowley (Brocket Hall) & Sophie Lamb (Clitheroe) lost to Virginia Carta & Martina Flori 2 down
Singles
Ratcliffe beat Mortigliengo 2/1
Madden beat Carta 1 up
Lamb lost to Liti 3/1
Olivia Winning (Rotherham) beat Flori 2/1
Cowley beat Camilla Mazzola 2/1