Team Wellington... no longer an association with Ole. Chur

Weekend review

Penalty dictated game 

Not sure you've made very clear what your point is, other than TW not currently winning the league...

Also TW piss poor finishing played  a big part as well. 

On the day the better team wins. Does not make them the better team over a season . Manu lose to NCU - MV lose to NJ and on we go. CU did well last year and came close, but so did TW the year before. 

IMO ChCh united would have the same budget as TW but it's a big leap to ACFC. So all ASB teams do the best they can on the day. Waitak draw with HBU, ..the gap is closing  - double  hic. Still at Bar Stool Investment Convention  

Cole now has been sent of twice against Canterbury in successive seasons. - was a liitle luckly not to received a straight red in the first half.

Need a lethal striker to keep us in touch.

Would have thought Joe Gaughan would have been worth a go, lethal finisher!

So tee dubs game not on sky this weekend.

Fail. 

So really no point in scheduling those ages at the stadium then. 

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=eLSF5ArAZHs

Link to the highlights.. Peno was weak and Claphams goal was more luck than skill.

Ugly for Tdubs though

Not sure about that penalty.

Thought that looked like a dive.

Westpac Stadium Gates Open 2.30 Saturday 14 December for TW v Wanders 2.45 kick off.

I completely agree. What is the point?

I happily go to watch Team Wellington at Dave F in their own right. Sitting for 4 hours in the Westpac watching this game played to no-one and then the Phoenix doesn't appeal so much - particularly when you have wife to keep onside!

I can understand trying to get more people interested in Team Wellington but for me this isn't the way to do it. I like the current arrangement of season ticket holders getting into Team Wellington games for free and being closer and more involved in the action at Dave F.

1pm at davey f with the bar open would have been ideal

When there was TV coverage last season it made sense, but this season?

Odd.

"Earlier this year betting experts flagged up the fact that more than one million was staked on the game between Welling and Billericay Town, more than on a Champions League match involving Barcelona the same night, despite only 408 spectators attending the fixture. Two betting firms opted not to take bets on Conference matches involving Chelmsford, Billericay and AFC Hornchurch games." - UK Daily Telegraph last week.

The franchise concept has worked better in Canterbury than the club model of the regional league champions having the right to enter the national league, which was disasterous in the 1990's.

Christchurch are really the pioneers of the merger/ franchise concept from the National League's inception in 1970. Christchurch United was actually formed as a new entity from the combined resources of several prominent local clubs (Christchurch City, Woolston, Rangers, Christchurch Technical and Shamrock) solely to contest the National League.

Thus, they had a lot of financial clout, connections and public support and were the only consistantly strong national league side in Christchurch 1970-1991. New Brighton competed in the league from 1972-1977. Other Christchurch clubs briefly competed in the league, Woolston and Rangers (by virtue of winning the Southern League) but never achieved much. United- New Brighton derbies in the 70's did attract the biggest crowds in National League history of 10.000 or so.

However, when the National league was discontinued in 1992, Christchurch United became just another local club.

When the National League was revived in 1996, 97, 98, as an invitational National Summer Soccer League, Woolston Working Men's Club were granted entry - a major disaster since it was just another small, not particularly distinguished local club.

Woolston failed spectacularly to attract the support of most football fans or players - fans and players remained loyal to their own clubs and Woolston had crowds of 200 - 400, always finishing last on the table. Many of the best Canterbury players indeed preferred to migrate north to play for Nelson Suburbs, seen as preferable to playing for a Woolston side many players from other local clubs felt to be a rival and less  competent organizationally than Nelson.

However, the franchise concept had already been launched at the Christchurch Casino (with financial backing from that institution and elsewhere) at the same time Woolston was applying to enter the new Summer League in 1996. The Canterbury franchise had the backing of most Christchurch clubs (well, all except Woolston) and top football people like Steve Woodin. Its application was rejected in favour of Woolston to howls of derision from most football folk in Christchurch.

I myself wrote to Bill McGowan advocating a franchise-based league or at least requesting he consider allowing a franchise entry for Canterbury. He however stuck to club-based criteria - until the wheels fell off the Summer League, clubs went bust and he made a turn around to accepting franchises were the way to go from 2004.

After Woolston realised they didn't have the resources on their own to field a competent side in the National League, they joined with the then most successful local club Christchurch Technical to form Christchurch City in the league for the 2000, 2001 seasons.

Canterbury United was in effect a franchise when it entered the still club-based national league, replacing Christchurch City after they voluntarily withdrew to allow them to take their place for the 2002 and 2003 seasons. Mainland Football now administered the national league entry. 

Such was the improvement in Canterbury's entrant in the national league in terms of results, crowds and financial performance, with all Canterbury clubs now supportive of the Canterbury United entry, that Bill McGowan changed his tune and opted for a franchise-based league from 2004 on - hence the advent of the NZ Football Championship. Nelson also came on board Canterbury United.

Even Waitakere City who had emerged as the dominant force in Auckland football in the early 1990's, becoming national champions in '90, '92, '95, '96 '97 were imploding by 2002 when they finished last and were relegated from the national league. Many clubs were struggling to stay afloat. Hence the shift to franchises, encouraging clubs to pool their resources to form stronger entities.

Auckland City's rise to prominence is only a post 2004 phenomenon. There was only one national league title for central Auckland in 18 years prior to 2004 !!!! The franchise league set-up has really benefited the central Auckland area - in the 18 years between Mount Wellington's last title win in 1986 and the NZFC's advent in 2004, the only club from the central Auckland area to win the national league was Central United in  2001 (they won the North Island League v South Island League play-off in 1999 when there was no national league - but that clearly doesn't count as winning the national league). Central United were never very successful in winning the national league - they had more success in the Chatham Cup.

Hi Peter,

A typically thoughtful summary. I'll put on my anorak and numpty hat and argue a couple of points of detail, however.

Uni-Mt Wellington also won the national league in 2000. And we should also note that in two season East Auckland (2003) and Central (1997) only missed out on the title on goal difference. 

And there is no reason to discount the 1999 title, it was touted as the national club championship. 

Further, in the early 90s Waitakere City were based at Western Springs, which geographically made them as central Auckland as you can get.

So, anyone so inclined could equally argue that it is exceptionally rare for Auckland not to have had a club  in at least the top two nationally over the past 30 years - which would conspire against the proposition that club strength in central Auckland is a post-2004 phenomenon.

Not that I want to be aligning myself with Aucklanders, mind. (Apart, perhaps from Wombat, if he is reading this).

Fair point Bruce

Some good points Bruce - except I don't think Uni-Mt Wellington won the National league in 2000 - it was Napier City Rovers:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_National_Soccer_League

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napier_City_Rovers

"Napier City Rovers have... won the old New Zealand National Soccer League in 1989, 1993, 1998, and 2000. They represented New Zealand at the Oceania Club Championship in 2001, finishing third."

Uni-Mount Wellington's last national league win was 1986 according to their own website: http://www.sportsground.co.nz/unimtafc/47785/

I still reject the 1999 "National Club Championship" as being a proper national league title - was just a one-off game between North island & South Island league winners. Quite different to the slog of contesting a whole season.

So I'm sticking with "only one national league title for a club that was clearly a central Auckland region club 1986 - 2004."

(Christchurch United won the league three times in that period - but  hummmffff...I'm reluctant to mention not since 1991...

Bruce, you'll have to make allowances for us grasping at reasons to denigrate Auckland football success down here...)

That's an interesting point about Waitakere City playing at Western Springs - but just how "central Auckland" were the club? Wasn't the club otherwise based in Waitakere in terms of administration, its other teams and support? Where did the spectators come from? My mother's family's club Charlton Athletic played its games at Crystal Palace's Selhurst Park in the late '80's - early '90's when the Valley was derelict but that didn't make it part of that geographical area of London (remained firmly SE London and Charlton suburb, rather than South London).

Hi Peter,

My error on 2000... But only partially. Uni-Mt Wellington actually won the 'league' part of the national league, but were beaten on penalties in the cup final part of the league. 

(My traditional side still thinks of them as league champs.)

Half accept your point on 1999. But the North Island league was actually a bloody tough league... from memory every single team in there had played national league in the 90s except Western Suburbs... Central were very worthy winners. The South Island league was perhaps not quite so rigorous. 

As for Waitakere, well, the club  was formed specifically to compete in the national league. In theory it was to be comprised of 'contributing' or 'feeder' clubs such as Lynndale (now Lynn-Avon) and West Auckland and was based at Western Springs - which Westies will tell you is not really west at all. 

Early on (some would say even late on) Waitakere never had a true west Auckland fan base in spite of all the bumph... people here sometimes mistake Jeff Vader for a Waitak fan, :-) but they are rare beasts.  It's supporters - if that is not too strong a term - come from all over the place. 

The club (clubrooms at the end of the stadium block)  was originally based at Western Springs, and had a Ponsonby PO Box.

And the players? Well, they initially came from all over Auckland... Kim Hughes, Justin Worlsey (North Shore), Glen Adam (Mt Wellington) Thomas Edge (Gisborne), Michael Legg (Mt Roskill), Marcus Gerbich (Waikato), Neil Woodhams (University), Colin Hume (Manurewa), Graeme Cameron (West Auckland), Tony Laus (Takapuna & West Auckland)

But I would concede you are correct insofar as concerns the SPIRIT of Waitakere (and its Godfather, Rex Dawkins) which came via the Kelston club which had zoomed through the northern league in the early-mid 80s and was at least suitably westerly. And definitely the pokie money was west...

During 1991 Waitakere merged with (took over) Massey AFC and became a true West Auckland club. 

Haven't really been following the ASBP since moving to Sydney, but a few of questions/observations:

- How many actual local Wellingtonian players (playing week in week out in CL) are in the TW squad and playing regularly?

- What's the point of signing so many out of towners and overseas players when they consistently fail to challenge for the title?

- Who is Matt Calcott accountable to? Does he have a criteria for success as Head Coach of TW? If it is just "to win the ASBP", I'm not too sure he has been quite successful in that regard...

Bruce/pete

I was involved at the inception of Waitakere City and while the original base was Western Springs and players were drawn from all over, it was most definitely a team designed to represent the West. Players like Jorgensen, R Gray, Woodhams, Laus, Wright, Hamlin and Legg were very much "westies", as was pretty much everyone behind the scenes. The Springs location was mainly because it was the only decent venue available, and the hard core of supporters (admittedly small) were very much from  further down SH16

I cant comment on the lack of passion recently but that's not just a Waitak issue. Anyhoo, not a drama - and perception is reality after all :)

Tks Happy Days.

I'm no expert, but in 1990 Waitakere were a great team. While Chch won the post-season top 5 playoffs, at the time that was definitely a secondary prize to winning the league, where Waitak won. I recall the trips to Western Springs and some torrid battles. Waitakere were the emerging force in Auckland, and those of us from out of town certainly didn't demarcate between east, west or central.  Woodhams was a tremendous player, Darren McLennan ran like a scalded cat, and Thomas Edge was clinical. 

Suppose we shouldn't completely take over the Wellington thread though. 

You have to wonder about Calcott, He has got Bertch who is with the Phoenix looking like he was close to signing contract and calcott doesnt even play him..... From what I saw pre season he was quite impressive and now seems to be bench or not at all.Heard hes been training, so obviously not injured.

Maybe time for change in Team not Wellington!

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You have to wonder about Calcott, He has got Bertch who is with the Phoenix looking like he was close to signing contract and calcott doesnt even play him..... From what I saw pre season he was quite impressive and now seems to be bench or not at all.Heard hes been training, so obviously not injured.

Maybe time for change in Team not Wellington!