Meet the Women’s Captains 2025/26

Women’s Blues Captain - Lara Branston

Hello, I’m Lara, the Women’s Blues captain for the 2025/26 season. I’m a third year Geography student at Jesus college, andhave been playing for the Blues for three years. 

Playing for CUAFC has been one of the most fulfilling parts of my Cambridge experience, and this year has been no different. 

With a significant turnover after the end of last season, saying goodbye to some CUAFC legends, we have had a huge influx of new talent rocking up. The team had a challenging start to the season, coming up against strengths of Loughborough once more, and having an early exit from the Cup. Nevertheless, with a few games under our belt, the Blues found our swing and ended Michaelmas term with an emphatic 4-3 win over Loughborough 3s, placing us 4th in the BUCS Midlands Tier 1 league. Heading into Lent, we are hoping for some big wins as we face Derby 1s and Nottingham 2s.

The team is buzzing to face O*ford in the Varsity Matches at the end of term, where we will seek vengeance from our narrow 2-1 loss in the league, and look to bring it home in front of a roaring home crowd.

Eagles Captains - Irene Bermudo Báguena and Nellie Ash

Hi there, we are Nellie and Irene, the Eagles (2s) co-captains for this season! This is our third season as CUAFC players and we’re studying Natural Sciences and Engineering respectively. Following an undefeated league run last season, we’re eager to double down on those wins and get a second promotion from Tier 3 with our new coach, Carl Rowland. So far we have remained undefeated in the league and the whole team put in a hard challenge against a strong Tier 2 team in the cup. Our current focus is set on facing Lincoln 1s twice this term, as we currently sit together at the top of the table. This is all very promising in the lead-up to varsity, as we’re excited to showcase all the hard work put in by the team this year. After an atmospheric 3-0 win at home last year, we can’t wait to repeat this feat in the opposition’s ground and achieve our 7th varsity win in a row!

Merlins Captains - Emmie Bailey and Eszter Szentiványi

Hi, we are Emmie and Eszter, Merlins co-captains! Emmie is a second-year doing geography, and Eszter is a third-year PBS student, and we are both in our second year of playing on the Merlins. It has been our honour to captain the Merlins in their first year in BUCS, and we could not have asked for a much better debut. Having won all but one of our league games in Michealmas term, we sit in 3rd in  with a game in hand. It was especially memorable making the inaugural CUAFC game at Grange Road a 13-0 win in our favour. We are incredibly proud of and thankful to every newcomer who has brought amazing energy, every returner who has continued their dedication to the team, and our coach for passionately tackling this new experience with us. In the remainder of the season we are excited to keep our winning streak going and climbing the league rankings, as well as of course winning Varsity. The Cambridge women's thirds have not lost against Oxf*rd yet, and we plan to keep up this tradition!