Queenstown keen to play attacking game

A COMPETITIVE showing last weekend has Queenstown FC in good spirits ahead of its derby game today.

The side will host Southland FC in the Southern Football League, as both teams search for their first points of the season.

Despite coming away with nothing last week, Queenstown showed it could compete with the league’s best against Cashmere Technical.

Jan Kumar had put the side up 10 and two goals to Jos Cartman left it tied at 33 midway through the second half.

It ended up going down 53 to the league favourite, which rode a threegoal performance from arguably the league’s top player, Aaron Clapham.

‘‘It could have been cricket in the end — if it ended up 1510, noone would have complained,’’ Queenstown coach Jamie Whitmarsh said.

‘‘Our goalkeeper was amazing, [making] some really good saves. ‘‘It was just a roller coaster. ‘‘We have to be true to the type of football we want to play and for us it’s a very attackminded attitude to the game.

‘‘They’re like that as well, so in the end it was just going to be like that.

‘‘We wanted to score, they wanted to score.’’

Queenstown would continue in that frame of mind for the rest of the season, looking to play a positive brand of football.

‘‘It doesn’t matter who we play, our attitude to the game will be we want to try to play a brand of football that we enjoy playing and gives us the best opportunity to score goals.

‘‘I’ve got players in my team whose real mindset is about attacking football.

‘‘There’s no way I want to change that, I just want to impress on my lads that’s the way we want to go.’’

Adding to the spice this weekend is the local derby factor.

Southland is Queenstown’s closest rival and last time the two teams met Southland walked away as victor.

Last week a rough start cost Southland as it went down 20 early in its 30 loss against Dunedin Technical.

It got better as the match progressed, though, and Whitmarsh was expecting a tough challenge.

‘‘It’s Southland v Queenstown, that’s always got an edge.

‘‘From a geography point of view, even though we’re miles apart, its our main realistic derby.

‘‘They’re always motivated to beat us and we’re always happy to beat them.

‘‘So they’ll be coming up here wanting to win and we’ll be doing our best to try to stop them.’’

Meanwhile Dunedin Tech travels to Christchurch to play the Coastal Spirit on Sunday.

In the other matches, Cashmere Tech hosts Ferrymead Bays and Nelson Suburbs travels to face Nomads United.