Youth team from Morecambe 'delirious with joy' after their first win in three years

Players from the Trimpell and Bare Rangers Football Club Under 11s side were left delirious with joy following their 6-0 triumph on Sunday (April 14).

The team had conceded hundreds of goals during 8-0 and 9-0 drubbings in their torrid winless run - as they failed to come out on top in 1,095 days.

But in scenes reminiscent of a cup final, they took off on victory laps at their ground in Morecambe, after their success - in front of 30 delighted parents.

Their manager Sophia Kolodziejska who took over the club so her son Charlie could play regular football, was left a "bawling mess" after two of her aces netted hattricks.

And she applauded their jubilant reaction while also paying tribute to her team's incredible strength and determination.

She said: "They did celebrate very well. I think a few tops came off, and they did a few victory laps of the pitch as well."

"It was like they won the Premier League. If the sports club was open, I would have gone and bought a bottle of champagne and sprayed it everywhere.

"By the final whistle, I was a bawling mess. In the end, the coach had to give the talk. I wasn't mentally stable enough to do it.

"They have just not given up. Sometimes loyalty, passion, consistency and determination can get you a lot further.

"We're trying to teach them that it's a team sport. You are not going to get anywhere if you don't work as a team, and they really did on Sunday."

Long-suffering goalkeeper Thomas Hunt said he was thrilled to finally see his team clinch victory - following their game against Heysham Blue Star Under 11s.

He added: "I am one of the longest-standing players, I've been at Trimpell for three years.

"We've had a lot of tough times, we got thrashed 8-0, 9-0, 6-1 and stuff like that. But I'm so glad that we pushed through and got a win.

"I celebrated with people on the bench and after the game, I went to my dad and jumped in his arms. For the rest of the day I celebrated, and it was amazing."

Sophia, 32, a nail technician from Morecambe, stepped in to manage the side when they were an under 9s team - and then saw them through the next three seasons.

She jokingly admitted that she "didn't have a clue" what she was doing when she began in the role but wanted to give the local lads a chance to play each week.

Sophia had the support of two coaches, Damon Hryniw and Steve Scott, who never gave up on honing their team's technical skills despite the dire losses.

And she said when they took to the field on Sunday, following her usual moral-boosting team talk, everything they had practised finally clicked into place.

Sophia said: "We'd been doing a lot of possession drills in training, and I said, 'Just go out there and play your hardest, do it for yourselves, but also, just have fun.' "And from that first whistle, it was maybe 15-20 mins until the first goal was scored.

"Two of the lads, Thomas Stuart and Layton Hryniw, they both scored a hattrick each, and that's how we got there."

Sophia said not all parents had backed her project over the years, with some taking their kids out of the club due to their struggle for form.

But she said following the victory, she was thrilled to get supportive messages from other local clubs' coaches and managers congratulating her.

She said: "I've had boys that will come and play half a season and then they don't want to come back after Christmas.

"And the parents are quite blunt saying, 'It's because you don't win, the team is rubbish'.

"They will go somewhere else because they think they can get something better.

"I sometimes feel it is quite hard being a female in a very male-dominated area - even though the league that we play in is mixed.

"So it was quite nice that other teams who we've played against previously, their coaches and managers have messaged me saying, 'Well done for sticking it out'.

"That's really, really nice to earn people's respect."

Sophia conceded that the victory had slightly gone to the lad's heads as they were beaten in their next game last night (Weds) 5-0.

But she said their success had given them a huge confidence boost.

She added: "It's not technically about the win, but that I know 14 kids have gone home on Sunday absolutely chuffed to bits with themselves, and what a massive confidence boost.

"They could walk into the school on Monday with their heads held high. It's a knock-on effect for everything."