Students continue fine run of form in Federation League
Massey University kept Manawatu¯’s flag flying in the men’s Federation League at the weekend when they won at Gisborne Thistle – and Palmerston North Marist lost at Havelock North Wanderers.
The upshot is the students now lead the competition by three points from Marist and Wanderers, who have a game in hand.
Thistle dropped to fourth spot, but also with a game in hand.
Massey and Wanderers are still unbeaten but meet in Palmerston North in a fortnight for the first time after the league takes a break next weekend for a round of cup games.
By half-time at Gisborne on Sunday, Massey led 3-2, which completed the scoring. The students’ goals came through Cole Freeman, Zac Farmer and Michael Hilson.
Coach Donald Piper said returning from Gisborne with three points was impressive. ‘‘We didn’t win it statistically in terms of chances created but we scored the goals,’’ he said.
Five Massey players are in the leading group of the Golden Boot contenders – Rhys Galyer, Farmer, George Andrew and Cole and Joe Freeman.
At Havelock North, Marist coach Juliano Schmeling said ‘‘individual mistakes’’ cost his side the game as Marist struggled to cope with Wanderers’ long ball game.
‘‘That caused us a lot of trouble, and we took a while to respond.’’
Wanderers were three up before Marist found the back of the net through winger Jordan Joblin-hall late in the game to score their only goal of the game.
In the home game at Palmerston North’s Memorial Park on Saturday, North End notched their second win of the season when they outclassed Levin 6-1.
North End’s goals came from a Lucian Armstrong hat-trick which included two penalties, plus Josh Sansom, Michael Sheridan and Young-jae Lee.
At 1-1 early in the first spell, Levin were still in the game but as North End applied pressure across the park the visitors couldn’t keep up no matter how hard they tried, which included a shot off the bar.
The win moved North End up to sixth place on the league ladder.
In the other games, Whanganui Athletic beat second-last New Plymouth Rangers 2-1.
■ There was no change at the top of the Horizons Premiership after the weekend, with leaders Feilding United and secondplaced Palmerston North Boys’ High School both winning again.
Feilding defeated North End reserves 3-0 and Boys’ High continued with their rich vein of goal-scoring in clobbering Marist reserves 8-4, bringing the schoolboys’ total to 22 goals netted in their last four games.