Northern Leagues

Was George the guy playing up front by himself for Suburbs? Big bald headed guy? Had some good touches at times but lacked support I thought.

Also the winger for Glenfield, small lad playing on the right in the 2nd half, was he at MAP last year?

Not sure on how many social teams they have a lot of o35 s etc... There summer soccer brings in 50 k. ..

Just think there a big club 3 floodlight pitches....

Juniors arnt good but good size numbers., 

True they haven't got many good kids coming through , no idea why..

I'm not a fan of them 

yep big george up front by himself - and the kid for Rovers out wide was Daniel Findlay - at Map last year..

was talking to a Taka play who said Danny has dragged 80% of Taka plus some from another club to Rovers with him. Apparently Rovers turnover a crap load on their bar? cranks Thur through Saturday?

Can't comment on the bar but yes most of last years Taka are now at Glenfield. A couple gone the other way also. Few from Bay Olympic there also - Mayne, Holloway, Gwyther, maybe more?

In saying that though I think maybe only 2 of those guys who went across from Taka played on Friday - Wong started and Chang came on as a sub for him after about 60. Could be mistaken but think those were the only 2.

Talking point of our game yesterday was opposition player deciding he wanted to headbutt our striker in the nose and got a red card for his troubles. Crazy stuff as it came out of nowhere really. You have to wonder sometimes.

Ngarua and Melville end 1-1, both teams looking like mid-tables units at this point, Ngarua have quite a good Chilean who has 3 goals so far, while McCarter up front for Melville looks good, set up a goal for Tewi Te Pou today and is a big strong target man. Fair result in the end, Melville came on strong in the second half

Watched north shore today was. Good game with shore coming from 2 down.. And just bout deserved there win.

Then got 2 nd half ellerslie v Birko . Birko looked way better than ellerslie, but lacked cutting edge...

Wanderers getting the experience of some Waikato FC players into their squad, should be a good team once again this season

Wanderers 8 Waitakere 0, just a superb display, Waitak are a bit honking though (I assume they're getting some guys back after the O-League), I'll post my match report once I'm done writing it for a bit more in-depth stuff if anyone is interested.

Keen to read about it mate!

8-0 ffs! Not taking anything away from Wanderers but how shit were Waitak to be on the bad end of that scoreline??

They were pretty bad, for their sakes I do hope they have some players coming into their squad at a later date, I consider myself to have reasonable knowledge of the NRFL and I only knew about four of their players, their defence were all at sea against the Waikato FC players who HW possessed. 

But yeah, couldn't have asked for much more from Wanderers, their direct styles are going to be helped significantly with the input of Singh and Varela from Waikato FC, and if they can get a full season from Dave Samson.

Here's the article, sorry about the length but the link to the website has so many errors in it that it's best to post the untarnished version here:

Hamilton Wanderers marked the beginning of their 100th season in superb style with an 8-0 thrashing of Waitakere City at Porritt Stadium today.

Mark Cossey's side put on a first-half masterclass to destroy a hapless Waitakere outfit who are without some squad members due to Waitakere United's O-League campaign, with the game being out of the visitors' reach within 40 minutes.

Wanderers looked lively right from the opening whistle, but took twenty minutes for their domination to show on the scoresheet with Raymond How opening the team's account for the season after Waitakere keeper Eamon Goodin spilt the ball from a corner; How being on hand to volley the ball home from two metres out.

Not a noted goalscorer, How had his second within 10 minutes thanks to another set-piece, while Waikato FC standout Gurjeet Singh made it 3-0 barely a minute later after a superb through-ball from fellow ASB Premiership player Alexi Varela.

Wanderers look to be big threats from set-piece play this season, with Wade Molony scoring their fourth after Adam Luque flicked on a free-kick, before Varela linked down the right with David Samson, whose excellent pin-point cross was headed home by Varela, who had continued his run.

The recruitment of several Waikato FC players has added an extra dimension to Cossey's game-plan, with Singh and Varela in particular providing a dose a speed and creativity missing slightly from last year's squad, cracking open the Waitakere defence on several occasions with simple runs in behind the defensive line.

Waitakere's misery was continued in the second half, with captain Ricky Broderson scoring directly from an in-swinging left-footed corner, before Hamilton Boys' High School student Dominic Edwards nabbed two late goals after good work from fellow substitute Graham Kay to start Wanderers' centennial campaign at the top of the league table.

It was a superb Saturday afternoon for the Waikato teams in the Northern League - in Division One Melville United crushed Mount Albert Ponsonby 6-0, with winger Ahmed Zammit scoring a double in his first start. Classy defenders Jason Chewins and Gavin Douglas put their names on the score-sheet, as did imported striker Jordan MacCarter and young midfielder Jama Boss.

They were joined in the top half of the Division One table by Ngaruawahia United, who easily overcame Papatoetoe with a 3-1 win at Centennial Park thanks to goals from Tim Kautai, Marcelo Sosa and Herve Kadiya, while Division Two's Claudelands Rovers snared a second-half equaliser to draw with Oratia United 2-2.

I went and watched 3 Kings and Birkenhead. I have to say that for a 1 all draw, the skill level was very very low. The biggest laugh I got was seeing Stu Hogg throwing a tantrum at his goal being disallowed for handball. A blind man on a horse could have seen it from the Sahara it was that obvious. Quite shameful really. Tweet about that Stu!

Otherwise just a poor display of football

Here's my write-up and photos from Bay Olympic vs East Coast Bays. Not exactly champagne football there either I didn't think... Wanderers might be the competition dark horse! Hope so anyway.

http://in-the-back-of-the.net/2013/04/06/battle-of-the-bays/

I watched  Kings v Birkenhead was a bit scrappy at he start but was ok ....

Kings pretty lucky to come away with a point.. As Birkenhead dominated the 2 nd half ... Kings just went long to Colligan..and scored with first shot of the game

Birkenhead had 2 goals disallowed .hit the bar ..... But overall an ok game....

Three kings keeper Liam? Was very good...

Onehunga Sports played 70 mins with 10 men to beat Ellerslie 2-0, Shane Pascoe got straight red pretty harsh call, attacker made the most of minimal contact. Solid defensive performance by Sports once they went down to 10, with ellerslie unable to create a any clear chances. Ellerslie weren't up to much.  

when you say harsh red card is that because it was so early or that it wasn't a massive foul?

for me you could use the word harsh, but you would have to use the word correct in the same sentence.

i agree OS played really well once down to 10 and while we dominated possession and territory we just didn't create any real chances - so disappointing result but the performance wasnt that bad and gives us some areas to focus on for the week ahead.

Harsh has to be in context with the rule book surely Chops.  Why was he sent? Last man?  Violent conduct? Offensive language?

well the last man rule dosn't exist anymore - they have altered the rule to be "denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity".

In this case even the most one eye sports supporters will attest to the fact that had the defender not bundled over the ellerslie striker he was going to collect the ball and have a shot 1v1 with the keeper (hopefully it would have been on target).

So i can accept it might be described as harsh, but it's a rule and i thought it was applied correctly.  once the ref blew for a foul he had no option but to pull the red card.

The 'last man' rule never existed. Its the colloquial name that we give it.

yeah i know that but the idea that if your the last man and you commit a foul that you should be red carded is now obsolete.  conversely if you stop an OGSO and your not the last man you should be red carded.. that's all i meant.

I think it really came about because it got to the stage where by players that knew a shot was coming and they just stopped it without playing fair. The reality is, the game is about goals and people want to see shots on goals. Anything that takes away from that should be punished. Its harsh but if you are the man at the back and you are beaten and you even pull on a shirt to stop the guy, get off the field. People have a hard time accepting that is not the action of the player but more the end result it stops.

totally agree.

Eastern Suburbs 6 North Force 0. Park footie. K Fallon, you have never sunk so low.

What did Fallon do at Suburbs? A bit more context would help

Kevin Fallon coaches them.

Yeah I know that, but his team won 6-0, why has he sunk so low? What did he do?

I think he means by coaching Suburbs he has sunk low.

I don't understand though. He's coached MAGS, and they would have faced some god awful teams down the years in school football.

If that was the case Toffeman, well he was coaching them last year too.

Precisely Buffon.

Sorry if I've created a bit of confusion. No specific incident - no biffo/public urination, etc. Toffeeman has it right - Fallon's team Eastern Suburbs, relegated last year, once best in the country (eh Leggy?) is now playing the likes of North Force in the Northern League 1st Div in what on the day looked to me pretty much like 'park footie'. Considering his past record, how much lower to go? Northern League 2nds? A fallen club, a fallen coach, 20-plus crowd...

Coaching the promising juniors of MAGS in Auck Sec Schools Premier Div seems a bit more worthy somehow. 

Well he took them down, so it's his own fault.

Very true.

It was the right decision as he was the last man, from where I was the striker made the most of it which is fear enough, think the defender was just trying to get goal side of the striker and actually let him get to the ball but as they crossed may have put a hand on him, thats from my angle up the other end of the pitch. Harsh because the striker went over with what seemed to be minimal contact. 

Off to go see Wanderers again, should be a big litmus test v Olympic, even if they aren't as stacked as last year they still should be a tough ask - should be a quality game.

Wanderers 2 Olympic 1, two well-taken penalties to Jarrod Young, both seemed legitimate penalties (the annoying Bay fans didn't like them much), the ref did alright having to deal with a fairly scrappy midfield battle, I'm still not sure whether the game was awesome or ugly.

With TKU and Bay Olympic looking not as good as last year it could be a league up for grabs for the likes of Central and Wanderers! Certainly interesting stuff.

I went to watch ECB v Birkenhead. Birkenhead played well a deserved their win. Thought the ref could have done a better job of protecting Hobson-McVeigh. ECB spent far too much time whinging rather than focusing on the game.

Great result! Love beating Bays. 

I must admit, I probably need to eat a bit of crow. I didn't rate a few of their players and thought they would struggle. They looked good, disciplined and played well. Stu Hogg came on and played the perfect role of knocking it about and that's when Bays probably gave up. John Fletcher was untroubled in the Birkenhead goal.