Good win by Karori footballers

By Grant Stephen

Waterside Karori cruised to a 3-1 win over bottom of the table Whanganui Athletic in their Central League Football match on 27 May.

The usual suspects put in a good shift for Karori with goals to Jorge Akers and Tomas Alvarado, along with a cameo appearance by Stefan Cordwell.

Jorge has his name on the Leaderboard for the Golden Boot competition and is currently in seventh place with seven goals. This is only three strikes behind the top gun for the moment, Matthew Brazier from Petone on 10 goals.

The Wharfies were scheduled to play on their usual home pitch. The usually pristine Karori 1 field failed its warrant of fitness after falling victim to heavy rain over recent weeks. The alternative venue of the plastic pitch at Wakefield Park had no adverse effect, though, with the Wharfies cruising to victory.

The halfway mark in the men’s Central League has been and gone and the title is Wellington Olympic’s to lose according to those in the know after the latest round of matches over the weekend.

Olympic scored at regular intervals and had a comfortable 5-2 win in the end over fellow title contender, Western Suburbs.

Ben Mata scored two penalties late in the peace with an earlier brace to Jack-Henry Sinclair as well as a score to the ever-present Hamish Watson. Wests’ goals went to Ryan Feutz and Lucas Finnigan.

Napier City Rovers defeated TFS North Wellington 3-1 at Park Island in sunny Hawkes Bay.

Rovers had the best of the encounter and scored all three goals in the first half with Josh Zatorski getting one back to salvage some pride for the visitors. Rovers took the points and landed in fourth spot for the weekend when the proverbial dust had settled.

With so many players involved with New Zealand Under 20 duties, the Wellington Phoenix Reserves match against Miramar Rangers has been postponed until late June. Stop Out v Petone has also been postponed until early July. The culprit this time was the unplayable pitch at Hutt Park.

A junior tournament the week before and the heavy rain once again means that it is unlikely there will be any games at Stop Out’s HQ for some weeks to come.

In the Women’s Central league, Wellington United has stolen the advantage over Waterside Karori for now.