dreams to reality

3.

It's match day against Chelsea and I couldn't be more buzzing. It's been a great few days, trainings been good, we're more prepared than ever and me and Leah have been talking more and more.

"Oi B you just gonna stand there" I hear Lotte shout snapping me out of my thoughts. "The bus is waiting" she adds on, "yeah coming, sorry" I say picking up my bag. When I get on the bus I immediately connect eyes with a certain someone. She motions for me to sit next to her which of course I did. "hi le" I say winking at her, knowing she hates that nickname. "hi smudger" she says back with a wink. "You know I only like smudge." I say, "you called me le" Leah says before we start bickering for a few minutes, laughing and joking about how stupid we were being.

The journey went very quick and we had already arrived at kingsmeadow. "Leah" I say nudging my friend. "Yeah bels" she says which the most softest voice. "Do you reckon I'll start today?" I ask her, "I don't see why you wouldn't, the only reason he won't play you is probably because you won't be as experienced as the rest of us." She says as we walk of the bus. I frown a little knowing I probably won't start, I mean Leah is right I'm so young and haven't played in the wsl before. "Don't beat yourself up, even if you don't start you'll probably come on" Leah says putting her arm around me, giving me a hug. "Yeah" I said before we enter the changing rooms.

"We'll here we go again Alex, a big game for both teams. Everything to play for. What's your thought on this one" the male commentator spoke.

"Yeah I think it'll be a good match up. Both teams had very little time to recover from the champions league match mid week but I'm excited. I'm mostly excited to see young Bella smith, I hope she makes her debut today. She's a special talent." Alex reply's.

It's about 20 minutes until kick off and the team line ups are as followed:

Arsenal: Zinsberger, catley, lotte , Williamson, maritz, little, nobbs, mead, miedema, foord and blackstenius.

Chelsea: Berger, bright, nouwen, carter, andersson, ingle, reiten, cuthbert, Kirby, harder and Kerr.

It's near the end of the warm up and I see stina blackstenius pull up after a sprint. I see medics go over and a few people crowd her. They talk for a while until Jonas flags me over. Oh god. Here we go.

"Stina is out, you've got to start for me. Get a quick warm up in with the girls and when we go inside I'll let you know the tactics." Jonas says before walking away. Holy shit. I'm away to start against Chelsea. I jog over to the starting team and Leah just smiles at me. She chucks me a bib, "you better be ready for this" she says before jogging off. I quickly put the bib on and the drill starts.

It's a few minutes before kick off and I'm waiting in the tunnel and My nerves are through the roof. Everything happened so quickly I don't know what to make of it. Jonas talked to me in the changing room about how to play the Chelsea centre backs. Basically to sum it up he said, 'you know they're physical and will try to bully you but I know you can put up a fight, your really good on the ball and quick. So get in behind or drop for it and show them what your made of'.

The last words really stuck in my head, im a young player from the academy that's dreamt of this day since I was little, I had to prove myself. I kiss my wrist and look up before the game starts.

Kick off

9th minute: attempt blocked by Leah Williamson which deflects for a corner. Chelsea are off to a quick start.

14th minute: Miedema plays a through ball to Foord who cuts it back to the edge of the box where Bella smith appears and fire a shot low to the bottom left corner. GOAL. What a finish by the youngster. 1-0 to the visitors.