Definitely. It hasn’t been an easy season, but looking back as a whole there’s no doubt we’re in a better place than we were at the start. The League table doesn’t lie, we’ve finished sixth, which is about right, but the building blocks are there and I’m looking for more to come next season.

It’s disappointing that we couldn’t get past Redditch in the League Cup Semi-Final. They were better than us on the day, but not by much, and they’ve shown where we have to be from the off next season.

Looking back, you made a slow start.

We did, but we played a couple of the better teams early on and you don’t always know that until the League takes shape. With hindsight, we held our own in those games. Beating Sphinx away from home in November was a real turning point. I think that was when we saw the real potential for the first time.

What were the other significant points of the season?

We had a really good run through January and February, which coincided with Amy Botfish joining us. She made a big difference, not just with her goals, but because she gave us a focal point up front. We’ve got some good attacking players through the middle and on both wings, but we lacked the “finisher” that the top teams have. Having her to play off has brought the best from the whole team. Before then we weren’t so good at finishing teams off – we would play well and dominate games, but just not put the ball in the net enough!

Defensively, only Redditch and Sphinx have conceded fewer goals than us. Considering we lost one of our centre-backs, Sam Whittaker, to pregnancy (and Gary thinks he has it tough with injuries!) before a ball was kicked I’m very happy with that. The whole defence has stepped up this season. They don’t get much limelight but they deserve a bit of praise as a unit.

Your form away from home has been remarkable!

Hasn’t it just?! We’ve only lost once away if you discount the concession at Redditch when we were hit by illness. But the flip-side is we only won three games out of nine at home, and that’s an area where there’s room for improvement.

What are your aspirations for next season?

I think we can challenge for the Title, it’s as simple as that. It seems likely that two teams will go up, although nothing is confirmed yet, and that will really open up the Division, although you never know the strength of promoted teams coming up. We’ve proved we can live with the top sides this season, we just have to make sure we can do that consistently.

We beat Gornal 4-1 away towards the end of the season, which was our best performance as a team. The scoreline didn’t flatter us one bit, against one of the Division’s top sides. If we can use that as the standard we want to reach week-in, week-out, I really don’t think we will be far off. But we lost the reverse game 0-3 a couple of weeks later – that’s the sort of thing we need to learn from.

I hope we can also encourage more supporters to come along and watch us. The girls play some good football, we try to attack the opposition and play an entertaining game. They’re well worth coming along to watch!

End of Season Awards

One Heart, One Way Award – Gee Thacker

Players’ Player of the Year – Charley Callear

Manager’s Player of the Year – Lili-Beth Bown

Supporters’ Player of the Year – Dani Ranger