Defending champion Highlanders beat close rival Momona
CITY Highlanders started its title defence on a positive note on Saturday.
It ground down losing finalist from 2017 Momona 20 in the last game of the night in week one of the Dunedin premier women’s competition.
These two again shape as the teams to beat this season, having been finalists the past two years.
The game started slowly with both teams taking some time to get into their work. Neither goalmouth really looked threatened at all for the first 10 minutes, despite plenty of attack.
City was the first to string together some positive attack, but was unable to turn a quick string of penalty corners into anything on the scoreboard.
With the usual Momona goalkeeper out injured, young Keyra Webb had stepped up from division two and made several good saves.
Tegan Buchanan opened the scoring for the women in orange when she found herself oneonone with Webb and was able to find the netting.
Momona was doing just enough to stay in the match, and threat ened to break back. Claudia Peyroux looked dangerous and Matisse Uluilelata defended strongly. However, it did not do enough to get on the scoreboard. City kept the pressure on and Sarah Allan doubled the lead late in the game.
In the other games, Taieri Tigers beat Uni Black Stingrays 31, while Uni White Huskies overcame Kings United 21.