Canterbury United

the extended relegation time with accumulation of points over 3-4 seasons is similar to what they use in Argentina and Brazil - except there the intention was to protect the big clubs from relegation if they have a horror season

based on the last 3 seasons of the ISPS Hamilton would be getting relegated but it would be possible for a team to finish 8th this season and have the Weenix and Southern United below them and still get relegated!

Wait. Are we second last, and could be actual last? What's going on? 

Simple. Mainland's CEO took over and Willie is back in Auckland.

Exactly that in a nut shell. CU had a good coach and everyone knocked him. Now you are finding out that he was actually ok.

Not a case if Willy is an OK gaffer or not, more or a case that the franchise had suffered two major losses, dollars wise, in the previous two seasons and changes had to be made to turn the red ink around by the Mainland Federation who run Canterbury United.

A restructure saw rolls altered, and less 'imports' in the Dragon's squad this season to save $$$ as members clearly indicated that they expected the Mainland Board turn the losses around in the coming years. 

Clearly Canterbury United not the only franchise making losses so how sustainable is the current premiership model if gaming trust money reduces further.

The indicators are that this is probably the last season of Otago's Irish experiment. The Football Souths reserves will have been utilised by seasons end.

and NZF's answer is to increase the league to 27 games!!!!

Until NZ Football or Canterbury United stands back and works out who their actual customers/stakeholders are with the league and how they can accommodate them the league is destined to fail.  

The teams may as well choose to play in a vacuum or an empty arena.  Pity help any one who turns up to watch as there may be one lonely window to queue at to buy a coffee or a pack of crisps.  Don't go at half time you won't see the start of the second half even with a few hundred in the crowd.

Last two crowds have been pretty decent. I for one am enjoying watching local home grown lads instead of of the average imports. I question whether Willie would have been able to get the same results from this group of players. In reality CU are far away from where they were at the same stage last season. Oh and Clapham will play for this coach.

Hey everyone, here is my piece from the Friday night game vs Tasman.

Canterbury vs Tasman

After watching the highlights from last weekends game and being in the stands myself im really not too surprised to see the position Canterbury are in.

Out of our forwards/attacking midfielders for goals we have King on 4 Chang on 2 zeb on 1 Ferguson on 1 Clapham on 2, not much else. Why has the coach not looked to strengthen this position. Too much pretty football and not enough of the dirty looking longer stuff which is where our goal Sunday actually came from. I get Padmore is deemed to be talented coach but clearly his experience or lack of is costing them. I was all for supporting the local boys and mostly this has been kept to but unsure if this Scottish striker will be staying put but he’s been very poor to say the least. Is there not a young boy or local forward who could match his 1 goal this season

Also talk in the stands that Pendrigh and Ben Stroud are being brought in, not exactly positions that need strengthening but who am I to judge. What’s everyone else’s views on the out of town players

Yer it's sometimes pretty tough to watch, and up front I agree we are lacking. In saying that, I can't stand the long ball, even if it resulted in a goal on the weekend, which did have a random bounce off too though...

After watching Canty continue to bring in one season wonders from anywhere for the past however many years, I like the idea our team is home grown. This is despite the glaring fact that 8 of the 11 are Tech players... 

We may very well end up at the arse end of the table once the season finishes. It certainly changes the fact that the normal course of action is the coach gets the sack. Pretty hard to do that when he's the boss as well! 

From what I heard neither of those players are coming into the team. Stroud is off for a trial in second tier USA football, and Pendrigh is off to perhaps the new national league entity in the region, Christchurch Utd.

How has Zeb been? Could have sworn he was a centre mid when I watched him at Kiwitea a while back, also heard talk of him contending for age-group squads

And Chang's still going strong... wow

It doesn’t have to be a 90 minutes of long balls but I would like to see them go more direct at times and look to get in behind chances and goals come from being in the opposite half and goals win games.

As I said the local players have largely been used which is great but I’m still unsure of bringing others in from out of town when surely there are better options in the youth or local leagues. I heard Pendrigh and Stroud were warming up in dragons kit on Sunday so only assuming they’ll be sticking around. I don’t see the need for them personally

Zeb has been good in patches struggles with an end product in my opinion and Chang is actually on fire with his 2 goals and a further 3 in training and warm ups which is a credit to him

Slight bias here but I thought he played well on the weekend. Had a few shots and does look dangerous when attacking. He played up front on the weekend but does drop back. He was with Coastal at the beginning of the season then went to Wgton for the Ole Academy I think. 

Yer they were deffo warming up in gear, maybe they are just in the group in order for fitness? Stroud is definitely going for a trial overseas next week.

I completely agree that while nobody wants to see long ball football all day - Wimbledon from back in the day - I also believe football is being way over complicated with the current emphasis on possession & patterns of play. If you look up & see your striker in a yards of space what's the harm in giving him the ball. 

I'm far from being Liverpool fan but I believe their current success is due to how well they mix things up & they have scored a number of goals by the backline banging balls directly to Mane & Salah - they would have scored even more if Salah passed to Mane on a few occassions earlier in the season - but nobody complains about Liverpool playing long ball football.

Winning football games purely comes down to scoring goals - possession & number of completed passes don't feature on any league tables, just wins draws losses & goals!!

More of the over complicated pretty football from the dragons today and very little direct stuff, shane it ended with a 6-1 hiding. The 1 goal coming to a long direct ball down the side. Needed some more of that

I have heard that Lyle Matheson and Dan Ede have been training in the new year so perhaps a change of style is on the cards. Can’t come soon enough for me as I  see pendrigh had the impact expected by everyone. Hoyle would have been laughing the whole game 

#Padmoreout

Ok, let's clear this up. The local lads are so obviously not good enough. Jacob Richards was so poor today he would struggle to make an MPL side. Luke Tongue completes 5% of his passes each match, runs around like a maniac and spends more time winding players up who are far better than he is when really he should take a look at what they do and try to copy it. Clapham can't keep up with the game and neither can King. The two imports never see the ball and when Fergusson does he sends it to QE2 (obviously apart from the cross which hit him on the face today). Liddecoat was poor again, Sam Field is a decent MPL player but is getting exposed too easily. Pendrigh came on and served them up a goal and looked completely useless. Knight was appalling today but has been our best player so will give him an exception. Corey Mitchell wins the ball, passes it back to them, wins it again, etc etc etc- what's the point? Chang has been our best player and that's a real shame. It's clear that the Lapslie boys, Abdul Khalifa, Tom Scott, Harry Bowman etc aren't up to it because they never get used and with half of the MPL currently training with the Dragons (Ede, Lyle etc) it proves that our local league is not up to scratch. We have not produced anybody who looks like a proper All White for years and that's the problem, the local game is poor, the Dragons have had to spend money to put together a decent side and now the money is gone there is nothing to fill the gaps. Don't blame Padmore yet, he's working with what he has and needs a good year or two to try and improve the standard of our local league before he is able to be properly judged. Any arguments, I'd love to hear them

At the game today was asked if the 6 - 1 defeat today was our heaviest ever defeat in the Premiership, thankfully the answer is no, worst result was 9 - 1 at English Park on 20 January 2008 against Waitakere United - with Rhodri Payne scoring our goal in first minute of added time in the second half.

Today's result was the Dragon's second heaviest defeat, surpassing a 6 - 2 defeat away to Youngheart Manawatu on 19 November 2006.

Today's goal, scored by Calum Ferguson, is just the third time in 262 league games that a Dragon's player scored in the opening minute, the others being Jeremy Brockie and Aaron Clapham.

Very disappointing result today. Firmly believe there is multiple players locally Canterbury can sign/should of signed that are better than half the squad right now. Style of play is ignorant slow lacking quality.  the imports are dead average. Let’s not forget this was against a depleted suburbs side as well. I can see the wooden spoon being a real possibility, possibly the first in the clubs history..?

The Dragons finished bottom of the table in the 2008/09 season, on goal difference,  with 2 wins, 2 draws and 10 losses from 14 games - 11 goals for and 32 against.  Otago United finished with the same playing record apart from scoring 16 goals.

Hearing that Lyle and Ede have both been signed with a couple of others let go. Anyone with an idea who they could be. Looking at the 2 players in I’d hope one is ferguson

Wonder why Canterbury hasn’t posted the highlights video of last weeks game yet... Dont worry here’s the link https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=share&v=sWVlNRpoXyA considering these lads just lost Tasman. This is a shocker 

Canterbury United went down to Southern United 2 - 1 after George King had put the Dragons 1 - 0 up at half time.

Does anyone know the team from today? Hopefully the new signings got a run or was it more of the same rubbish from previous weeks

Hopefully the new signings didn't get a run or else we are still sharke despite the new signings & there is no longer any light at the end of the tunnel!! 

See image in Southern's tweet:
https://twitter.com/southern_united/status/1220855103780818944

Pendrigh, Richards, Zeb were subs used, with Pendrigh also getting red card.

Pendrigh came on and got red carded. What a couple of contributions in the last two games and yet more goals from our non scoring Scotsman. To be bettered in a goal to game ratio by Chang takes some doing

How does one twin get recorded as being British and one being English? Did one vote for Brexit and the other not? 

Third game in a row were we have taken the lead but ended the games without any points. 

At home to Waitakere United next Sunday - 4pm kickoff so must be the live Sky game of the round.

And..... we’re last.

Nows the time to get rid of those imports who won’t be around winter time - Dalton and Ferguson lets just give local players a crack for the final 7 games. What do we have to lose 

Relegation awaits ... in the proposed (?) new national league model canterbury united would play in MPL. Is that right?  LOL, that’s not going to happen. So it would then fall to a club (looking at ewe Rams) to gain promotion somehow?  As Kramer said, “I’m so confused”.

And I thought our Halligan. Monsef days were over.

Last place what a surprise... ?

Lots of negative comments which is understandable  to a point

Look at what Lee has to deal with.

Limited funds due to previous seasons where nothing was won either  

Players not wanting to play national league due to  not getting paid like they do through mpl

Players not being able to commit to four sessions per week 

Limit of 5 non kiwis maybe clubs who have the best interest of Canterbury football look at themselves  

We finally have a guy playing as many local players as possible 

Who has any great positive realistic ideas. 

I doubt there are many that have been more frustrated than me over last ten years. 

I'm a long way away from Canterbury geographically but it's pretty apparent that sides in the premiership run by the federations - canterbury , Southern , Hawkes bay and previously WaiBop - are not successful. The four sides that have won the premiership since it's inception - Auckland, Waitak , Wellington and Eastern Suburbs have all been club based. There is an inherent conflict between the activities of the federation and running an elite football side. Additionally the best administarors in NZ football have always been the unpaid volunteers , not the paid administrators with their fancy qualifications. Maybe it's time for the Russian and ChCh Utd to take over ?