Alnwick Town Ladies make it through to the last 16 of cup after win against Ponteland United

Alnwick were the favourites to win the first-round tie, sitting a league above their opponents, who had seven players unavailable and were unable to name any subs on the day.

After successfully negotiating the preliminary round thanks to an 8-0 win against Gateshead, this was a much tighter affair, with Alnwick running out 3-2 winners thanks to goals from Katie Ellwood, Chloe Young – who have both now scored three goals in their two games this season – the winner coming from Emily Henderson.

The team’s next match is away at Barnsley in the league on Sunday, when they will play at the famous Oakwell stadium, home of Barnsley FC. It will be the Barnsley women’s team’s first match as an official Barnsley FC women’s team.

The next home game is against Bradford City on September 10, kick-off at 2pm.

The women’s game is growing in popularity year-on-year. Four years ago only six of the 73 clubs with men’s teams in Northumberland had women’s teams, the NERWL now has 36 teams split into three divisions, with Alnwick Town playing in the Premier league, above the Northern and Southern leagues.

Famously, Lucy Bronze, the losing Women’s World Cup finalist with England who now plays in Spain for Barcelona, had to leave Alnwick Town when she was 12 years old because the FA wouldn’t allow her to play football for the boys’ team and Alnwick Town didn’t have a women’s team.