Hamilton North Football Club

We started the season with our first game out at a rainy Kopua Domain, v Raglan Sea Snakes. Being the first game, the team were still getting to know each other, but some awesome individual skills resulted in two very well taken goals for Kayla Goodwin, which she then followed up with some amazing defence. Unfortunately Raglan sprung our off-side trap a few times and despite the best goal-keeping efforts of Luke Peters and Martin van Blerk, they managed to score two goals as well. Some fantastic tackling by everyone…hitting a bit harder this year than last. A 2-2 draw was probably a fair result though. Player of the Day for her all-round “being everywhere” game – Kayla Goodwin.

Next up we faced St Josephs Chiefs. As quite often happens, after a sustained period on attack by the Falcons, the Chiefs broke away and scored the first of the game. This was enough to spark our guys up a little and we remembered the drills that we had been practicing. With a little more luck, we would have had a few goals in the first half, but had to settle for 1 – 1 at half time (thanks to a well taken goal by Martin van Blerk). They had a few chances in the first half too, but Kayla managed to intimidate her former team-mates enough to put them off. The second half started as the first had finished, with the Falcons passing well into space and putting pressure on the Chiefs’ goal. This pressure finally told when we scored another 3 goals (2 more for Martin). The Chiefs tried gallantly to peg us back, but some wonderful goal-keeping by Alexander Cutler, including one awesome reflex save from point blank range, kept them at bay, and it finished at 4 -1 (with a Hat-Trick for Martin). Martin was the deserved Player of the Day.

This last week we played the Koromatua Tigers. I thought we were in for a tough game when they went and hid themselves away for their warm-up so we couldn’t check them out beforehand. My worst fears were realised when, after 18 seconds or so, we were 1 – Nil down. A call from one of our team to the ref to start again fell on deaf ears (sad when you can’t even rely on your own coach to pull a few strings). Unfortunately for the Tigers, this stung the Falcons into action. Possibly the highlight of the first half was Martin latching on to a perfect through-ball from Rikihana Ngaruhe (on the end of some awesome passing) to score the second of his 4 goals. Particularly pleasing for the Falcon’s coaches was the way the everyone was playing as a team, passing into gaps, running into space…a wonderful team effort. Some good keeping by Rikihana when the Tigers were suddenly the only ones running at him managed to keep them out. Of particular note was the Player of the Day performance from Alexander Cutler. He was passing down the line, into space, shooting from a fair way out (he said it was a cross….but I think we all know the truth), actual crosses and another fantastic pass in behind the defence that helped Martin bag his last goal and then running back on defence as well. An awesome 4 – 1 win though, so well done all.

Brent