MELVILLE MAGIC 13 E-NEWSLETTER

MELVILLE MAGIC 2022 | 13

23 JULY 2022

24 JULY 2022

Back in the winter of 1972 Bob Owens had become frustrated at the haphazard state of junior football structures in his neighbourhood and got together with another Scouser, Tony Tatler, to form a new club from scratch.

That initial Melville District Schoolboys club has grown into the Melville United AFC of today, and now we are about to celebrate 50 years of football.

The weekend of November 4-6 2022 has been set for 50-year celebrations and a club reunion to reflect upon an incredible journey full of highs, lows and milestones.

The following events have been scheduled for the Celebration of 50 Years programme... # A Friday night Mix & Mingle cocktail evening at Gower Park (including historic slide show and anniversary merchandise). # A number of Saturday matches at Gower Park # A formal dinner (with guest speaker and band) on Saturday November 5. # A range of anniversary apparel will also be available (more details later).

To assist our planning for these events, we ask that people register their interest on the Melville United website.

It is particularly important that we receive early (and firm) expressions of interest for the Saturday night dinner. Price and venue will be announced shortly but there will be an unavoidable size limit for this event and preference will be given to those who have registered their interest early.

Finally, if you are in possession of any old photos of Melville players of occasions, we would appreciate high resolutions copies sent to the following email address. melvilleunitedafc1972@gmail.com

Chairman's Welcome It has been an exceptionally busy and challenging week in the life of the club.

Against a backdrop of a funeral for first team manager Steve Bettis at the same time as we have been trying to adapt to running club operations without him.

We have had a Youthtown school holiday programme for 60 kids running at Gower Park.

Meanwhile, we have also been involved in facilitating an NZ Football U20 ID Game between a WaiBOP/Central Football selection and Northern Region selection, while also running academy midweek fixtures.

Thanks to all who attended Steve’s funeral. There have been fulsome tributes elsewhere, but it bears reinforcing that he was both one of our hardest-working club members as well as one of our most distinguished.

Today we welcome Waiheke United. We have the slightly bizarre record of having always beaten Waiheke away from home - and always having lost to them at home.

Melville showed immense character last week to beat Manuaku United 4-0 away. A measure of the win was that midweek champions Auckland City could only beat them 3-1.

Given the often troublesome state of our back pitches at Gower Park, Korikori Park in Rototuna has been an important part of our operations for academy team games this winter, and it is likely all academy matches will go there next winter.

The club has recently installed a new alarm system thanks to Aotea Security, and we are working towards installing a CCTV system in the clubrooms and carpark.

A proposal to have Hikitron electric vehicle chargers installed in our club carparks is now with council, awaiting approval at the August round of meetings.

The club is on the verge of finalising the purchase of a 14-seater van to assist with the huge amount of out-of-province travel we undertake weekly these days.

Our 50th year celebration plans are proceeding for the weekend of November 4-6, with a formal dinner (with guest speaker and band) planned for Saturday night, and priced at $80 a ticket. More details will follow.

Batesy

Sam Says

We come back to Gower Park after a really challenging week for our club.

More qualified and articulate people than me have paid amazing tributes to Steve B, but its safe to say that his loss to the club and in particular our first team group has been incredibly emotional.

Under difficult circumstances our lads were superb last weekend against a really good Manukau United side.

I felt like we got back to the level of energy and effort defensively that has been a hallmark of our play this season. On top of that, there were some superb goals that I’m sure even Steve would have been impressed with.

On a more positive note, we have had a number of our young players involved in NZF age group camps and games this week. This is further evidence of the talent we have at our club and the fantastic work that is going on with our younger age groups.

This weekend is also the last for Kieran Richards before he heads back to the USA. His contribution mid-season has been excellent as ever. Kieran will be joined in the States by younger brother Ethan who has also been an important part of our wider squad. We wish you both all the best and look forward to seeing you back at Gower in the future.

Welcome back to Waiheke United and their traveling supporters. We endured a frustrating day against them two weeks ago and I know the players are looking forward to another really tough challenge. You can't take anything for granted in football and we will need to be at our energetic best to get a result today.

Hopefully we can get the job done and put in a performance that would have put a smile on Steve B’s face.

Enjoy the game!

Wilky

1. Max TOMMY (GK) 2. Braeden QUILTER-PHIPPS 3. Aaron SCOTT (c) 4. Luke SEARLE 5. Campbell BROWN 6.

7. Harry CHRISTENSEN-ROSE 8. Liam HAYES 9. Ryen LAWRENCE 10. Jerson LAGOS 11. Quinton KIPARA 12. Oliver COLLOTY 13. Kieran RICHARDS 14. Sean LIDDICOAT 15. Stafford DOWLING 16. Moh REYNOLDS 17. Josh GALLETLY 18. John OAKMAN 19. Raheem HUNTER 20. Conor JAMIESON (GK) 21. Sean LEADLEY 22. Lemuel LE HANE 23. Dylan WILLIAMS 24. Joey OMOTANI 25. Ethan RICHARDS

1. Hossein MEHRABI (GK) 2.

3. Felix KNIGHT 4. Roshan CALUSTRE 5.

6. Alan LLUNES (c) 7. Bert DE RAAT 8.

9. Emiliano CANDIA 10.

11. Nicolas Federico VANINA 12. Gaspar MENA 13. Eyob TEKALION 14. Jonty EPSKAMP 15. Kelly ESCOLME 16. Jean NDUNGUKA 20. Lautaro LATORRE 21. Ashley MUTIZE 22. Sebastian CIGANDA (GK) 26. Kiwa BURKE-MUNNS 27. Lionel NGENDAHAYO 28. Sam DALTON 29. Juan Cruz CANAY 31. Noah BURKE-MUNNS 34. Felix TIMMINS-SCANLON

Coach: Sam WILKINSON Assistant Coach: Harry TRETHOWAN Operations: Seamus MARTEN Physio: James YOUNG Manager: Danny MILNER

Coach: Thabiso Elliot TLEANE Assistant Coach: Sammy NEGASH Assistant Coach: Simon BICKERTON Physio: Luke REYNOLDS Manager: Gareth JENKINSON

Referee: Andrew LAMBETH | AR1: Nigel HATFIELD | AR2: Carl WATKINS

Melville’s inspirational run away from home Super Melville produced their best performance in over a month in battering a strong Manukau United 4-0 away in northern premier league football.

It was a wonderful display in difficult circumstances, as Melville rediscovered their spirit, their culture of playing for each other, and plenty of dogged resolve as well in a fiercely contested match.

In victory, Melville reclaimed the Joma Cup, contested between the two clubs.

In the aftermath it was inevitably interpreted as a fitting team tribute to much-loved team manager Steve Bettis, who had died in unexpected circumstances 24-hours earlier.

But after four home games of mixed results, including two losses on the trot, it was also a salient reminder of how dominant Melville have been with their away form this season.

It was Melville’s seventh away win out of eight matches, with the only loss being desperately unlucky first-up against champions-elect Auckland City. Otherwise the Unicorns have scored 26 and conceded just three away from Gower Park.

Melville are third on the table, with a 5-point margin to Wanderers, the best of the clubs outside the top four.

For Manukau, former Auckland City and Miramar striker Joao Moreira sulked dangerously around up front. But Melville’s experienced back three – Sean Liddicoat, Aaron Scott and Luke Searle - made a strong start, especially Liddicoat, who made some inspired early interventions to break up play.

After a number of good chances had been created, Josh Galletly open Melville’s account in the 25th minute with a stinging swerving shot which he leathered home from the edge of the area.

The 19-year-old is technically Melville’s best midfield marksman, so in a sense he was overdue with this being just his second goal of the season.

When Oli Colloty added Melville’s second 10 minutes into the second spell, he was well prepared with his personal hand-written tribute (S.B. RIP) to Bettis scribbled on his undershirt. It was a thoughtful touch which escaped a booking.

If Melville needed this goal, in a sense so did Colloty, who hadn’t netted in seven outings. Colloty will always hold his place because of his intelligent all-round play, but goals are the currency by which strikers are ultimately valued, and this was his ninth of the season.

Stafford Dowling curled home a right footer from the edge of the area in the 73rd minute for his sixth of the season. It was good reward for Dowling, who does a lot of the hard yards for Melville simply on account of the fact he has the stamina of a brewery horse.

Then it was party time when substitute Moh Reynolds headed home in the 84th minute. Scott started the move with a probing run, pause and pass down the right. He found harry Rose, who crossed perfectly with his right foot for Reynolds to nut in his first of the season – and against the club he started the season with.

Manukau had plenty of chances themselves but hit the post, the bar and had several go just wide. So they were not a mug team, and could well finish the league higher than their current sixth spot, though must face Auckland City on Tuesday.

Wilkinson declined to name a player of the day, calling it a team effort. But Galletly and Scott were quality, Dowling was occasionally inspirational, Liddicoat had some fine moments, Max Tommy made one fantastic save, and Liam Hayes was nice and compact – and never got booked.

A tribute to Steve Bettis You really do become conscious of your own sense of mortality when you start writing a tribute to the late Stevie B. If you were drawing up a Grim Reaper’s Sweepstake from Melville ranks this time last week, Steve Bettis, Melville’s long-time first team manager, life member and 4-times club player of the year, wouldn’t have been in the top 30 picks.

Steve died on Friday July 15, shortly before he was due to head to Gower Park to clean the clubrooms ahead of weekend matches, as had been his habit for years.

Didn’t smoke, didn’t drink. Didn’t womanise. (What even is ‘womanising’ that makes it a vice rather than a virtue?) Hell, Steve, who was seriously gluten-intolerant, barely even ate – just his own home-cut lunches, kept tidily in a wrapper on the middle shelf of the Gower Park kitchen fridge.

He was a permanent N95 double-masker and the only member of Melville’s management team to avoid Covid. He drove a Nana car, which had all the personality of an Ulster St motel. And he drove it very sensibly. In a Gower carpark full of “Fuck You SUVs”, sporty dating cars and boy racer machines, Steve’s only stood out because of the quaint “THEKOP” number plate, tell-tale sign of an Anfield addict.

In retirement Steve retained the same bodyweight as his playing days. Fit as a fiddle.

Still played 6-a-side in his 60s. In short, he was never a candidate for an early grave.

One week recently he completed 13 pitch markings - and then spent 4 hours cleaning the clubrooms. In all respects Steve Bettis was a perfectionist.

And yet, here we are. Nobody knows what fate has in store for them.

Steve undertook his significant Gower Park duties in the same manner he played his football in earlier decades – compact, organised, always on the move, with the peripheral vision to pick out what might happen next.

Trust, respect and loyalty were big in his world. Even bigger was an enduring sense of duty. As Sam Wilkinson noted, Steve didn’t stand around in the rain at training on a bleak Tuesday night because he enjoyed it – he just had a higher, more finely tuned sense than most club members that it was something that needed to be done.

Steve was no fan of technology. He would have been right at home on an Amish farm.

You never saw him on social media or any of that new-fangled interweb stuff. Didn’t even have a computer, let alone an email address.

In the end the club insisted on supplying him with a mobile phone. Maddeningly, for the first eight years at least, he would keep it turned off apart from matchdays.

Though in the last couple of years did pluck up the resolve to at least send texts when he thought something wasn’t quite right. ("having big probs with marker width has got narrower as day has gone on now only about half width if that not sure what to do.")

So it was kind of spooky on Friday to have been toying around with the hydraulic hose couplings on the line marker, only to find it really ramped up the spray pressure. The joy of fishing out the mobile phone to text Steve that we had a result, was tempered by finding a stark incoming text: “Steve Bettis has just passed away.”

Steve was a relative loner and not a big socialiser. Beyond Gower Park, Lynn Cook’s wider household was his de facto family, which meant in more recent times he came to regard Sam Wilkinson (and Michael Mayne) as family.

So it’s vaguely paradoxical that it took Steve’s death to get Mayney back onto the Melville coaching bench this weekend.

Steve and I weren’t friends in the traditional sense. He was not someone to have a beer and a laugh with. But we would often find ourselves vaguely adjacent along the perimeter fence at the north end of No 1 on matchdays and swap sardonic observations. Or perhaps midweek jointly ponder on how to get that bloody line marker working better.

In that respect let’s not paint Steve brighter in death than he was in life. The truth is, Stevie B was a glass-half-empty guy. It was almost as if he was forever expecting the worst in the fervent hope of then somehow being pleasantly surprised when the foreshadowed doom never quite eventuated.

For instance, had Stevie been at Walter Massey Park, with Melville 4-0 up and playing their hearts out, he would be the one to quietly point out there was still time to lose 5-4. And he didn’t think much of some of the midfield passing either. And the players should be talking more, coach might have made an earlier sub, etc.

Further, no matter how often it happened, as Gower Park’s premier ball-recoverer, Steve was forever astonished at the inability of Melville players to stop hitting the ball over the bloody bar in pre-match warm-ups.

You probably saw him at least once silently shaking his head and then scurrying off to rescue another ball from the carpark. This was a reminder of Bettis’ First Law of Goalscoring: If you can’t hit the target in warm-up drills, you never will in any match that follows.

Having said that, Steve was always a model of politeness and fine etiquette. He would only ever let those he implicitly trusted and respected into his inner sanctum of brooding doubts and negativity.

Steve made his northern league debut as a teen with Affco Rangers in Horotiu in the early 70s, but with that club slowly imploding and edging towards amalgamation with Ngaruawahia, he started looking for options closer to home in 1976.

In the end he joined Melville simply because he had been approached by Garry White (son of former Waikato Football Association secretary Ron White) after Alan Chapman broke his leg and Melville – playing in Waikato league division two - urgently needed a replacement.

Steve had done some pre-season training with Claudelands Rovers and when he then threw in his lot with Melville, Rovers successfully demanded a $2 registration fee reimbursement via the Waikato Football Association. So Steve thus became the first Melville player to have cost the club transfer money.

It proved to be a great investment. Steve was exceptionally valuable to Melville in those early years, not just because he was a human dynamo on the pitch – a nonstop runner for 90 minutes, who played in all positions “from striker to the deepest sweeper you have ever seen”, to quote his long-time pal, Tubby Smith.

Yes, he picked up player of the year in 1979, 1980, 1984 and 1986. But post-match he was even more in demand. Those were very boozy times and Melville travelled vast distances in the northern league Div 4 South.

Evan at home the clubrooms – once they arrived in 1986 - would be rocking until 10pm on matchday with Waikato Draught and Rheineck guzzled by the jug-load.

Because he was practically the only person in the club who didn’t drink, Steve was a godsend for getting the other lads home, or perhaps to The Lady Hamilton (ask your dad).

In more recent years while the rest of us were getting bladdered inside after a game, you might just have caught a glimpse of Steve out in the shadows, ferreting around putting up signs, sweeping the changing rooms, or sorting the gear.

On other occasions you might offer to come down at 9am and help set up on a Saturday morning. But that would be a mistake. Steve seemed to take such offers as a weird kind of existential challenge – and he would go out of his way to arrive even 90 minutes earlier and get everything done before the help arrived.

And every week he would leave a hand-written message behind the bar at Gower Park for Big Phil as to what had been done, and what might still need attention.

Sometimes these epistles could be Tolstoy-esque and run to some pages.

But this was his pithy last-ever message, as left on the cash register.

Hi Phil, Got all the pitches marked Wednesday, including going over the worst lines on 2, 4,5, 7 & 8. then on Thursday remarked pitch 2 completely.

After finishing pitch 2 the mower man arrived and mowed all the pitches including 2.

So some of the markings on 2 are not what they were before the pitch was mowed.

Anyway, did the best I could which included going over some of the lines on 7 & 8 after Wednesday night’s training (did this Thursday).

Regards. Steve B. PS. Hi Phil, we need some more paper hand towels.

So that was Steve. The first bloke to notice hand towels needed replacing.

On reflection, a teeny bit of the sadness we are feeling about Steve leaving this mortal coil could also be because we will all have work a little bit harder now he has gone.

In many respects Steve was a mystery. Perhaps that’s a product of our tendency to compartmentalise people or only appreciate one segment of people’s wider lives. But who knew exactly how old Steve really was? (Some comedian had registered him on Comet as being 40). Did he still have any family? What exactly was in that backpack he wore every waking hour?

We may never know. But what we do know is Stevie B deserves a decent send-off. We won’t see his like again, if only because he came from an era when clubs were something to give to rather than to take from.

As an ardent Liverpool fan, he was also a curious counter-balance to the fiercely strong Everton roots of the club’s founders and second wave of movers and shakers.

It may be fitting at the next home game if You’ll Never Walk Alone is played, just once, in Steve’s honour.

Of course the bigger perversity is that he won’t be around for Melville 50th celebrations, where he would have fitted the bill better than just about anybody. So maybe the Saturday night dinner should be christened The Steve Bettis Memorial Dinner.

Not that Steve would have eaten very much, or have touched a drop. And he probably would have spotted something wrong with the tablecloths.

U23s back to winning ways Melville U23s beat Manukau United 5-2, with goals to Jakob England (2), Sean Leadley (2) and Jose Wenceslao. Melville are fourth on the table.

Academy round up|03 July Matthew d’Hotman, Jack Phillips and Carlos Ranui attended a U17 ID Camp at St Peters School in Cambridge, while on the women’s side Charlotte Eagle and Manaia Elliott will also be in camp this week as preparations for the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup in India continue.

Elsewhere, U15 Academy member Max Gurnick was invited to play in a selection against the New Zealand women’s under 20s last week as part of their preparations for the upcoming FIFA U-20 World Cup in Costa Rica.

LOTTO NRFL U14 Mixed | Round 09 U14 Academy 1-0 Fencibles United U14 LOTTO NRFL U15 Mixed | Round 09 U15 Academy 2-3 Fencibles U15

Weekend fixtures|24 July WaiBOP U13 Y-League | Round 02 U13 Academy v Hamilton Wanderers U13 Gower Park | 10.00am LOTTO NRFL U14 Mixed | Round 15 U14 Academy v Western Springs U14 Korikori Park | 11.30am LOTTO NRFL U15 Mixed | Round 15 U15 Academy v Western Springs U15 Korikori Park | 1.30pm LOTTO NRFL Bottom 6| Round 03 U17 Academy v Auckland City U17 Korikori Park | 1.30pm

Waikato wrap|02 July The Feds scored another useful home win, despatching Ngongotaha 4-1 to see them sitting in sixth place in the WaiBOP Premiership. Tauranga Old Blues have withdrawn from the competition.

In Division 1, the Mighty As were the only side to emerge victorious, with Corinthians and the Nobs both losing. The Mighty As are fifth in the league, a point behind the Nobs with two games in hand. Corinthians are seventh in the eight-team league.

The Men's Bs are eighth out of 10 in Division 2, while the Old Boys now find themselves in Division 2 of the Over 35s league after the competition split into two for the remainder of the season.

Waikato Men's Division 1 | Round 12 Mighty As 2-1 Claudelands Rovers Squatters Northern United U23s 4-2 Corinthians Claudelands Rovers Wallys 2-1 Nobs Waikato Men's Division 2 | Round 12 Claudelands Rovers Vets 3-2 Men's Bs Waikato Men's Over 35s | Round 12 Cambridge FC Well Over 35s 0-1 Old Boys WaiBOP Premiership | Round 15 Federation 4-1 Ngongotaha

Weekend fixtures|23 July Waikato Men's Division 1 | Round 13 Claudelands Rovers Squatters v Nobs Galloway Park | 12.30pm Corinthians v Mighty As Gower Park | 2.45pm Waikato Men's Division 2 | Round 13 Men's B v Eastern City Gower Park | 12.30pm Waikato Men's Over 35s Division 2| Round 01 Old Boys - bye WaiBOP Premiership | Round 16 Waikato Unicol v Federation Jansen Park | 2.45pm

Women's wrap|17 July The women's first team defeated previously unbeaten WaiBOP W-League leaders Otumoetai United 3-2 in the upset of the round. Melville got off to a good start and scored through Zaineh Abdelrazeq in the 7th minute. However, Brea Venimore scored twice for Otumoetai United, giving them a 2-1 lead at half-time. Libby McMillan leveled for Melville on the hour and with only four minutes to go, Fatima Ali scored the winner.

WaiBOP W-League | Round 12 Women's First Team 3-2 Otumoetai United Waikato Women's Division 1 | Round 12 Waikato Unicol Reserves 5-1 Women's Reserves Waikato Women's Division 2 | Round 12 Epics 4-0 Mangakino United Women's B

Weekend fixtures|23 & 24 July Academy Fixtures | Saturday, 23 July LOTTO NRFL U14 Girls | Round 14 U14 Girls Academy v Ellerslie U14 Girls Gower Park | 11.00am LOTTO NRFL U16 Girls | Round 14 Northern Rovers U16 Girls v U16 Girls Academy McFetridge Park | Auckland | 12.00pm Senior Fixtures | Sunday, 24 July Waikato Women's Division 1 | Round 13 Women's Reserves v Ngaruawahia United Women's Div 1 Gower Park | 11.00am Waikato Women's Division 2 | Round 13 Morrinsville Ladies Div 2 v Epics Morrinsville Recreation Ground | 11.00am WaiBOP W-League | Round 13 Otumoetai FC v Melville United Fergusson Park | Otumoetai | 1.00pm

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