Get to the SToK Cae Ras on Sunday. That’s an order!

The women’s team are hosting Swansea City in the Adran Premier, a game I’ve been looking forward to for some time. After last weekend’s result, it has taken on a greater significance. This is no longer just a chance to show the progress we’ve made: it is a game which we need to get something out of to avoid conceding a dangerous-looking gap to the top two already.

This isn’t how it was supposed to be. I can’t express how excited I was after the opening game of the season. We might have lost to Cardiff City, but it was an excellent performance against the champions. I’d go so far as to say it was our best performance since promotion to the Ardal Premier.

As I packed up my equipment in the press box, I just couldn’t wait to see the team play again, and get a fair reward for their improvement. Sunday’s game at The Racecourse felt like it had come at just the right time.

However, there was one concern in the back of my mind: in the meantime we had to play at Briton Ferry. That’s right, the team we were lucky to squeeze past to earn promotion two seasons ago.

It was always going to be a tough trip, and we underperformed. Having suggested the Cardiff game was a landmark performance, it’s not unreasonable to suggest we went from our best performance in the Adran Premier to the worst in seven days.

The game got away from us early on, and credit has to go to Briton Ferry’s energy and organisation as they pressed us judiciously and forced a succession of turn-overs in our own half in the opening 30 minutes.

Steve Dale is a smart coach, and he responded by changing shape and putting Liv Fuller into the heart of midfield. She is an excellent passer of the ball, and she solved the problems we experienced when playing out from the back. However, we were two goals down and playing catch-up by then.

You never get anything less than 100% commitment from this Wrexham side, and they battled away to the final whistle, but for a second week in a row couldn’t find the cutting edge.

So why am I urging you to get to the SToK Cae Rad and get behind this team?

Firstly, Sunday’s defeat was one isolated poor performance. The direction of travel is extremely promising. We’ve shown a consistent improvement since turning semi-professional, and the opening day of the season merely continued the pattern.

Our last game of last season was our first Welsh Cup Final, and was another cruel 2-0 loss to Cardiff in a game we dominated. We’ve gone very swiftly from digging deep against the big two and looking to stay in the game to taking them on and slugging it out toe-to-toe. It’s been a brilliant journey, and I can assure you that you don’t want to miss out on it and jump on the bandwagon later.

Also, we really owe Swansea one! Unlike Cardiff, we were much more competitive against The Swans last season. On the opening day of the campaign we looked to have the game won, but they grabbed an equaliser in the fourth minute of added time despite being down to ten players.

We might have had a player advantage, but we were on our knees; the excellent fitness work which made such a difference last season naturally hadn’t kicked in by that point.

We were leading at their ground in the return fixture, but ended up losing 2-1, and kicked off phase 2 with another good away performance, only to lose 3-2.

The cruellest blow came when we welcomed them to The SToK Cae Ras we three games of the season left. We’d just been thumped by Cardiff but bounced back brilliantly, controlling the game.

However Swansea had a nasty habit of being able to score against the run of play, as good teams tend to! Dominating the game is great, but you need to cash on with goals. We ran the game for half an hour but only had Lili Jones’ screamer to show for it.

A side like Swansea aren’t going to pass up so many chances, and while their first goal was a penalty which felt like a punch in the guts, so unlikely did it seem, they took advantage and were ahead 10 minutes after the break.

Steve Dale did what he does when a game has turned against us, and made smart changes. They worked and we worked up a terrific momentum kicking towards the Kop. Carra Jones and Rosie Hughes combined brilliantly for the latter to equalise with 10 minutes left (above), and there looked likely to be only one winner.

I think you know what’s coming next.

A cross from deep on the right went straight in, and Swansea had a winner in the second minute of added time!

This is starting to sound like a tale of heartbreak, but the truth is that this exciting side is on the verge of turning the corner. Don’t miss out on players making memories like Wrexham fanatic Jones scoring that astonishing goal against Swansea last season.

The added jeopardy of having no points and no goals is obviously a concern, but supporting a team is all about sticking with them so you have earned the good times. That’s why I assure you that if you go on Sunday, you won’t regret it, if only because you’ve discovered a second Wrexham side to follow!