Sutton bounced back from last week’s League Cup defeat at Bromley, and the loss of leading scorer Gabby Williams, to move up to fourth place in the London & South East Regional League, within five points of leaders Saltdean. It was a hard-fought victory in a physical game against a side whose performance belied their lowly league status and record of only one win in their ten games, but Emma Spear’s well taken goal midway through the first half gave U’s the lead and Milly Cutler added two goals after the break to give the scoreline a more comfortable look.
Cutler had two early chances when played in from the right, but on both occasions she was denied by the Newhaven goalkeeper, but the breakthrough came when Spear ran beyond the defence on to a long pass from K’Shaela Burch-Waldron and took the ball round the oncoming keeper before rolling it in to the net.
Newhaven had the ball in Sutton’s net when a long range shot flew over Megan Taylor but the referee had already stopped play due to an injury, and early in the second half, after Brianna Gilbert-Lawal had shot wide after being put through by Cutler, they had an opportunity to make life difficult for U’s when Burch-Waldron was sent to the sin bin for ten minutes following a foul in midfield. However Sutton made light of being a player short as Brianna Gilbert-Lawal shot wide after being put to double the lead when Taylor’s long clearance bounced off the head of a defender and left Cutler clear to score with a neat lob over the advancing keeper.
Newhaven came close to reducing the arrears when a low cross from the right was controlled by a striker in the middle who then shot wide of Taylor’s goal, but there were no further alarms for U’s, whose second half substitutions included a return to first team action for Fern Colepio, and they put the game beyond the hosts with ten minutes to go when Amy Warren’s perfect low pass through the defence allowed Cutler to go on and shoot low past the keeper.
Sutton: M Taylor, T Allen, E Meehan, E Oliver, B Humphrey, A Warren, E Spear, K Burch-Waldron, M Cutler, B Gilbert-Lawal, E Clark. Subs E Moon, R Olumodeji, P Langley, C Chase, F Colepio.
Sutton’s Development team went out of the Capital Intermediate Cup on the back of a 4-0 defeat against AFC Greenwich Borough at West Byfleet Recreation Ground, the visitors scoring twice in each half.
