Free Sleepover Club Goes For Goal! by Fiona Cummings Page A

two,” he replied.
    “Can one of us go in goal?” asked Rosie.
    “Well, yes,” Mr Pownall replied, “but that will mean you’re short in the outfield. Why don’t we just ask for a rematch when Fliss has recovered? I’m sure Hollymount won’t mind.”
    “I can hold out for two minutes,” Fliss saidbravely, struggling to her feet. “I think we can win this match, and I’m not giving up now!”
    We all hugged her, despite her wincing and squealing, “Mind my foot!”
    I took charge of the tactics.
    “Tighten up the defence at the back!” I told Rosie and Lyndz. “We’ll have to protect Fliss as much as possible.”
    From the re-start it was clear that Hollymount Girls were going for the kill. It was like being charged down by a herd of hungry rhinoceros. Poor Fliss, she had this look of total panic in her eyes. After one close shave, when Lyndz had only just managed to prevent their player from shooting on target, Fliss whispered:
    “Please score Kenny, because there’s no way I can get through extra time!”
    Talk about pressure! Time was fast running out and we needed a goal. I must have let my concentration slip for a second as I was planning how to score one, because one minute I had the ball, the next I’d given it away. I could see the others at sixes and sevens allover the pitch, and Hollymount’s striker was in an acre of space. She was bound to score. THWACK! The ball thundered towards Fliss. There was no way she could save it!
    “Dive, Fliss!” I heard Ryan yelling. “To your left!”
    Fliss leapt the full width of the goal. She looked to have got down too late but the ball hit her leg and flew back out of the goalmouth.
Coo-ell!!
    “Way to go, Fliss!” I yelled. But I could see that she was clutching her ankle in agony.
    When the ball had bounced out, Rosie had got it and was streaking down the pitch with it. I was caught between wanting to help Fliss and scoring a goal. Frankie was out on the wing, and Rosie found her with a perfect pass. But I could see two Hollymount girls rushing to tackle her.
    “Over here, Frankie!” I yelled, and sprinted up the pitch, with Fliss screaming “Go Kenny!” behind me.
    Frankie tried to cross the ball but it ricocheted off one of Hollymount’s players – right into the path of Rosie. She had a perfect sight of goal and nobody marking her.
    “Shoot
!” yelled Ryan Scott and Danny McCloud.
    “Shoot
!” yelled Frankie, Lyndz and Fliss.
    I could hardly bear to look. Rosie had never been good at shooting practice and she looked to be panicking too much. It was all happening too fast, but at the same time it all seemed to be in slow motion. I saw her take her foot back, I saw the ball bobbling about and…
    “GOOOAAALLL
!”
    She’d scored! I rushed over to her and flung my arms round her.
    “I don’t believe I did that!” she was gasping. She almost looked as though she was going to cry.
    “We’ve got to keep it together until the whistle goes!” I told the others when we’d calmed down a bit.
    And let me tell you, that was the longest minute of my life. I felt as though I could have walked into Leicester and back before the referee finally blew for time.
    As you can imagine, as soon as we heard it we just went crazy. You’d have thought we’d won the World Cup or something! The crowd rushed on to the pitch and all these people engulfed us. It was totally awesome. Even Fliss forgot about her ankle so that she could join in with the celebrations too.
    We didn’t forget to commiserate with the other team though. We finally caught up with them in the changing room afterwards and shook their hands and told them how well they’d played. They all looked pretty down, so we tried not to get too hyper about winning the match.
    “Shouldn’t we exchange shirts or something?” I asked their captain.
    She looked at my shirt. “Erm, I don’t think so,” she said, screwing up her nose.
    I looked down, and my shirt was one massive swirl of black