Bolters Pines on cusp of big league
US call prompts City rejig
PACIFIC Pines started life in the Coast League 1 competition this year as rank outsiders, a team up from the third tier and supposedly there only to make up the numbers.
Yet the Pines can etch a place in local history tonight by beating Gold Coast Knights in a season highlight fixture at their Brockman Way Sports Park headquarters.
A victory would earn Pacific Pines (35 points) automatic promotion to Premier League in 2017.
A draw would keep them a point ahead of the Knights (34 points) with one round re- maining but a loss will hurt. It is getting to high-tension stage, Pacific Pines coach Steve Macdonald conceded.
“I think the main thing is that if we draw then it will still be in our hands but of course we’d like to win this one and get promotion the easy way,” he said.
In the final round, the Pines have to play Southport, the team that beat the Knights last weekend.
The Knights have bottom club Robina City.
Whichever team finishes second in Coast League 1 goes on to play the second-bottom team from Premier League in a two-leg promotion-relegation battle.
Meanwhile, the only inter- est left in the Premier League is which club will finish second on the ladder and earn the finals double chance.
Broadbeach United have already clinched the championship – they did that with four rounds to go – but Surfers Paradise (34 points, +18 goal difference) and Magic United (34, +24) are both gunning for a top-two finish.
Magic should beat Mudgeeraba at Birmingham Road today, throwing the pressure on Surfers, who are away to Coomera at Viney Park.
In other Gold Coast Premier games, Murwillumbah host Palm Beach at Jim Devine Field and Burleigh Heads take on Broadbeach United at Pizzey Park. AMERICAN college calls have robbed Gold Coast City of two of their most promising young players for the rest of the NPL Queensland season.
Teenagers Austin Ludwik and Lochlan Reus played their last games for City in their 3-1 win against Olympic FC last weekend and are out of the club’s latest venture to spread the NPL gospel around the Coast.
City are up against Brisbane Roar Youth tomorrow at the Runaway Bay Super Sports Centre at 5pm.
And coach Grae Piddick is using the match to give two more promising teenagers their big chance at the state’s top level.
“Moriano Kone will be one addition to the bench as a replacement for Austin and Lochlan,” Piddick said.
“He’s up from our youth side but he has played NPL before. Tim Jackson will be starting and he’s a regular firstteam player anyway.
“The other change to the bench is likely to be Riley Thompson-King.”
City are still chasing a toptwo finish but they need Far North Queensland to lose their last two matches.
“FNQ are playing Moreton Bay on Saturday so at least we’ll know about that before we play,” Piddick said.