Grand Final 2010

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Grand Final 2010

Waitakere Come From Behind To Claim Title

by Jeremy Ruane

Waitakere United scored a come-from-behind 3-1 victory over ten-man Canterbury United at Fred Taylor Park on April 24 to win the 2009-10 NZ Football Championship and maintain the Queen City’s stranglehold on the two OFC Champions League spots currently available to New Zealand entries.

But there was no doubt that the 37th minute dismissal of Paul Dirou, for an agricultural above-knee-height challenge on Jason Rowley, played a significant part in the final outcome, for up to this point Canterbury had given as good as they got from a Waitakere team which started strongly.

Indeed, just 75 seconds had elapsed when the West Aucklanders first tested Tom Batty, Canterbury’s ‘keeper saving at the second attempt at the feet of Brent Fisher after Benjamin Totori had rampaged down the left and scythed past two opponents before crossing to the near post.

"The Dragons" response rocked their opponents, for in the sixth minute, Canterbury opened the scoring with their first attack. Batty dashed out of his penalty area to clear a Fisher-led charge, hoisting the ball downfield towards Russell Kamo.

Waitakere’s player-coach, Neil Emblen, was favourite to win the ball, but dealt with it inadequately, allowing Kamo to work a series of one-twos with Tom Lancaster which culminated in the latter lashing a left-foot drive beyond the diving Danny Robinson from twenty yards.

Cat amongst the pigeons stuff, this, and the pigeons didn’t like it! Indeed, it took the team playing in their fourth consecutive NZFC Grand Final a few minutes to come to grips with the situation, by which time the Cantabrians could well have doubled their lead.

Aaron Clapham volleyed straight at Robinson in the ninth minute after Waitakere failed to deal with a Dan Terris free-kick, while a twenty-yarder from Nick Wortelboer fizzed inches past the ‘keeper’s right-hand post as the home team continued to struggle to come to terms with trailing at such an early stage of this showpiece fixture.

Robinson then produced a fine save to tip Dirou’s near post header, from a Terris cross, round the corner in the sixteenth minute, before Waitakere finally got their act together and began pressing for an equaliser.

Totori had already gone on a couple of solo sorties before clumsily undoing all his hard work, but it was speedy side-kick Roy Krishna who ignited United’s prospects in the eighteenth minute with a breathtaking solo run from half-way past three opponents which culminated in a shot which struck the leg of Batty, cannoned onto the post and back into the hands of the relieved goalkeeper.

Four minutes later, Jake Butler intercepted a Canterbury pass and instantly played the ball to Krishna, who touched it into Totori’s stride. He jinked inside a defender but shot straight at Batty from fifteen yards.

Krishna then hit the post from the edge of the penalty area in the 25th minute as hesitant Canterbury defending came close to being punished by opponents who were really getting into their stride by now.

Allan Pearce was doing just that in the 27th minute when he found himself playing the part of the meat in a Canterbury sandwich just outside the penalty area. Neil Sykes’ free-kick was punched off the head of Emblen by Batty, who looked on seconds later as a Pearce cross from a short corner skimmed the newly-shaven skull of Fisher.

Glen Collins cleared Canterbury’s lines and set off a speedy counter-attack, Kamo receiving the ball and holding it up well before Clapham steamed up in support on the left and took the striker’s pass in his

stride.

Clapham dashed into the penalty area, but as he let fly, Krishna - where did he come from? - lunged at the ball and diverted the shot to safety. A terrific piece of recovery play by a player more noted for setting up and scoring goals than for stopping them.

After Robinson grabbed a Lancaster effort at his near post, the equaliser Waitakere had been threatening finally materialised in the 34th minute. Totori scampered down the left once more before standing up the sluggish Matt Boyd and fair battering the ball beyond Batty and into the back of the net - 1-1.

The goal came as a blow to Canterbury, but what happened next was a blow from which they never recovered. Dirou, emerging from an aerial duel, lunged after the ball but ended up catching Rowley above the knee - studs showing, ball nowhere near.

There was only feasible punishment, and referee Jamie Cross duly brandished the red card, reducing Canterbury to ten men for the remainder of the match. He also wielded the yellow card twice more before half-time as tempers started to fray, one of the recipients being Sykes, who could very easily have been following Dirou to the showers for his challenge.

Boyd headed narrowly past Waitakere’s left-hand post as all admired a Clapham free-kick from distance soon after the sending-off, while Canterbury were swiftly out of the blocks in the second spell, Robinson forced to smother a Clapham drive from twenty-five yards after Wortelboer had linked with Kamo, who was now ploughing a lone furrow in the visitors’ attack due to their numerical inferiority.

But Waitakere responded swiftly, Batty forced to pluck the ball off the toes of Fisher after Sykes and Krishna had combined on the left flank. It was down the opposite wing which Totori caused havoc in the 54th minute, again befuddling Boyd before pulling the ball back between Fisher and Krishna, but behind the incoming Butler, who was unable to retrieve the situation with any degree of accuracy.

Sturdy challenges were still flying in during the early stages of the second spell, and one, from Wortelboer, was avoided by Pearce as he burst into the penalty area in the 56th minute. The striker’s shot cannoned off the arm of another tackler, Terris, and ricocheted to safety.

Waitakere’s penalty appeals were waved away by referee Cross, whose next act was to award the home team a goal seconds later. Butler fed Pearce as he dashed through the inside-right channel, and the player who later collected the Man of the Match trophy swiftly controlled the ball before steering the ball beyond Batty and inside the far post to put United ahead for the first time in the game.

Canterbury now had to throw caution to the wind, although Waitakere’s goal had had an air of inevitability about it, particularly given the way they had been pressing the ten men further into their own half. And they continued to do make their numerical advantage tell after taking the lead.

Fisher’s fine shot on the turn was grabbed by Batty on the hour, while a super solo cross-field run past four opponents by Krishna culminated in the flying Fijian feeding Pearce, whose shot past Batty was cleared off the line by the retreating figure of Boyd in the 63rd minute.

Acrobatic hip-turn volleys from Pearce - a cross - and Totori - a subsequent attempt on goal - kept Canterbury on the back foot next, before Pearce chipped a shot inches past the far post from the edge of the penalty area after the visitors failed to deal with a Sykes free-kick.

Batty thwarted Fisher at close-range soon after before Clapham led a brief riposte for "The

Dragons". The midfielder’s free-kick picked out the head of Gareth Rowe, whose effort was grabbed under the crossbar by Robinson, who had been more of a spectator than an active participant in the second spell to this point.

He was on his toes again soon after, Clapham’s cross-field ball picking out substitute Darren Overton, whose volley across the penalty area to Kamo proved too difficult for the striker to control and direct a shot on target in the same instant.

Waitakere responded with a brilliant match-winning goal. Totori gathered the sphere on the edge of the penalty area before touching it into the path of his captain. Butler had plenty to do, but boy, did he do it well!

Between the edge of the area and the penalty spot, he somehow dribbled and jinked his way through four challenges before slipping an angled pass to Totori, who swerved inside another defender before steering a shot past Batty and into the back of the net, much to the delight of his team-mates, particularly the goal’s architect.

Waitakere’s delight turned to dismay within two minutes of that exquisite 73rd minute strike. Krishna and Totori worked a one-two on the edge of Canterbury’s penalty area which saw the Fijian hurtle into the eighteen yard box, only to be tackled from behind by Canterbury’s captain, Terris.

A stonewall penalty if ever there was one, and arguably a red card offence also - the defender was the last man. But referee Cross, who erred with a penalty decision he made in the 2009 Chatham Cup Final, got this one wrong as well - he waved play on this time, and kept his cards in his pocket as well.

That Krishna ultimately needed to be carried from the field on a stretcher and required the assistance of a crutch simply to take part in post-match celebrations served merely to emphasise the official’s error on this occasion - it was not the finest ninety minutes in the officiating career of the former NZ U-17 goalkeeper, that’s for sure!

The sight of Krishna departing the fray prematurely took a lot of the sting out of the match, and with Waitakere controlling the situation comfortably against Canterbury’s ten men, it drifted towards its conclusion, although the visitors, who had produced some enterprising one-touch moves when they had their full compliment on the park, did enjoy their fair share of possession in the time remaining.

With it, they looked to gain a late consolation goal, a deflected Lancaster shot wrong-footing Robinson but flying wide, with the goalkeeper forced to paw the resulting corner to safety, the last act of a Grand Final won 3-1 by Waitakere, their second triumph in three years greatly aided by a Canterbury dismissal which, while deserved for the rashness of the challenge, came at a time when the game was very tantalisingly poised.

Waitakere will hope that this isn’t their last triumph on home turf this season, given they host Hekari Souths United in the second leg of the OFC Champions League Grand Final at Fred Taylor Park on Sunday, May 2.

But the likely absence of Krishna, through injury, could greatly impact on their plans to overhaul the three-goal deficit and deny the Papua New Guinea champions the chance to represent Oceania at December’s FIFA Club World Cup Finals, a prize which the newly crowned New Zealand champions are keen to enjoy themselves.

Waitakere: Robinson; Myers, Rowley (booked, 38) (Pelter, 90), Emblen, Sykes (booked, 45); Pearce (Lucas, 90), Butler, Bullock (booked, 23), Krishna (de Vries, 79); Fisher, Totori

Canterbury: Batty; Terris, Rowe, Collins (Overton, 59), Wortelboer; Boyd, Pitman (Barton, 80), Dirou (sent off, 37); Clapham, Kamo (Frame, 88), Lancaster

Referee: Jamie Cross

National League