JUST weeks after Leicester City were crowned the Premier League champions, schoolgirls from Gloucestershire were at the home of the new title holders looking to land their own piece of football glory.

Blue Coat School had fought their way through the county and regional qualifying stages to reach the King Power Stadium and a place in the prestigious Danone National Cup final rounds.

And they have come away with a brilliant result from the seven-a-side tournament, which took place on May 22.

Blue Coat reached the big finale after they scoring a total of 34 goals against local schools in the preliminary rounds at Katharine Lady Berkeley’s School in Wotton-under-Edge to progress to the Gloucestershire County Inter Schools competition at Oxstalls Sports Park in Gloucester last year.

There, they came top in their group to represent Gloucestershire at the South West English Schools Football Association competition at Odd Down, Bath.

In that tournament, Blue Coat, as Gloucestershire, scored eight goals in four matches, conceding only one, before they drew 1-1 with Devon but went through to the final on penalties where they then beat Dorset by 3-0.

And so, with the support of seventy of the players’ family members plus school staff, the girls enjoyed an amazing experience at Leicester City FC where they were outstanding in the early rounds to reach the final against a team from St Edward’s Catholic School, Cleveland.

They had no goals scored against them in the qualifying rounds at Leicester where they played five games and drew 0-0 after extra time in the final. However, this time, the big prize of becoming national champions did not go their way as they were agonisingly beaten by St Edward’s on penalties.

Nevertheless, everyone at Blue Coat are tremendously proud of the girls as they gave their all in the games they played and to be second in the whole country is a great achievement.