MK Dons Women lifted the Berks and Bucks FA Senior Women’s Cup for a sixth time following a 3-0 victory over Abingdon United.
Charlie Bill’s side produced a superb performance in their Final at the Meadow and secured the silverware would be returning to Milton Keynes thanks to Laura Mitchell’s brace and a second-half goal from top-scorer Mollie Coupar.
Mitchell was back in the starting XI as Charlie Bill made three changes to his side from their midweek defeat to Oxford United in the FAWNL Southern Premier Division. Angelina Nixon and Hannah Samuels were the other additions to the team.
Bill’s alterations made an early impact too, as MITCHELL opened the scoring on 22 minutes, showing great alertness to pounce on Nicola Puddick’s saved shot and fire home the rebound. 1-0.
The Dons maintained their one-goal lead through until half-time and survived an early scare at the start of the second thanks to some terrific goalkeeping from Chloe Sansom.
Bill’s team wanted a second goal to make the game safe and they found it with a little under a quarter of an hour left to play - MITCHELL, again, on the scoresheet, this time finding the net with a header from Tally Miles' corner. 2-0.
The Dons then settled any nerves by scoring a third with three minutes left to play. Mitchell turned provider this time to set away top scorer COUPAR, who got across her defender and beat the goalkeeper one-on-one. 3-0.
Speaking to CWSportRadio.com afterwards, manager Charlie Bill said: “I’m extremely proud and really pleased for the group. We’ve got to enjoy these memories and, for this young group, hopefully this is just the start.
“It wasn’t our best performance or most complete performance but the key thing in finals is that you produce in the key moments. It wasn’t the perfect performance but we won the game 3-0 and we’ve won the cup.
“Abingdon were fantastic and gave us a really good game but we kept doing the right things. Second half, we were relentless and got our rewards later on.”
Bill added: “One of our targets this season was to win this cup having not done that last year. Everyone can be really proud of themselves and we can enjoy this Sunday a little more than usual.”
MK Dons: Sansom, Warren, Puddick (Bennett 84), Biggadike, Nixon, Miles, Gould (Rush 62), Coupar, Mithcell, Newman, Samuels (Davies 89).
Subs: Guy
Goals: Mitchell (22, 77), Coupar (87)
Images captured by CTFPhotography
