Convincing win in friendly against Budaörs

As is known, key matches await Balázs Dörnyei’s team after the international break: next Friday we visit Szekszárd in Round 19 of the Simple Women’s League, then five days later we can fight Ferencváros for the trophy in the Hungarian Cup final. Our opponents have lifted the trophy six times and, after eliminating the holders, reached the final again for the first time since 2021. Before those competitive fixtures, however, our team still had one friendly to play: on Saturday from 14:00 we hosted Budaörs at the academy. 

We had to wait 18 minutes for the opening goal. After a pass from Maria Palama, our forward Eszter Czinege fired into the bottom-right corner (1–0). Our Greek defender had been sidelined this season by cruciate and collateral ligament tears, and although this was only her second appearance after the lengthy injury, she had already helped the team by winning a penalty in the derby against Újpest and now contributed an assist. In the 30th minute Adrienn Végh played the ball to Eszter Czinege, who calmly rolled it into the net for her second goal (2–0). Shortly afterwards Eszter Csáki crossed into the middle, but the visiting goalkeeper tipped the ball away from under the bar. 

We took a two-goal lead into the second half. In the 59th minute Ivana Trbojevic delivered a free kick into the middle, but our goalkeeper Agnes Stenlund was able to make the save at the last moment. In the 60th minute our head coach freshened things up with a double substitution: Eliza Nagy replaced Anna Sain, while Szonja Széchenyi came on for Agnes Stenlund. In the 70th minute we came close to making it three: after a cross from Gyöngyvér Szalay, Eszter Czinege tried to glance the ball on, but it rebounded off the post. 

HONVÉD: Stenlund (Széchenyi 60.) Czinege, Róth, Csáki, Szalay, Végh (Feil 77.), Williams, Palama (Földvári 31.), Sain (Nagy 60.), Bokor, Simon Head coach: Dörnyei Balázs

Budaörs: Csapó, Sárosi, Kovács, Papp, Ambach, Trbojevic, Oláh, Fodó, Kajdy, Puskás, Proháczik Head coach: Horváth Ferenc

Goals: Czinege (18.), (30.)

Balázs Dörnyei, head coach: “After the work we put in during the week, this was a really enjoyable match for the girls. They worked very hard all week; we are trying to regain our conditioning in every respect. We have had a lot of matches recently, so we have not been able to train in our usual rhythm. It was a kind of celebration at the end of the week to be able to play against a first-division team. We would also like to thank Budaörs for accepting our invitation and allowing us to play a good match.”

Eliza Nagy: “It felt very good to play against Budaörs and I was happy that my team-mates encouraged me as well. We started a little sleepily, but then we picked up the tempo and managed to play a very good match.”