Auck City work hard to beat Canty Utd

Defending champions Auckland City and Eastern Suburbs have continued to set the pace at the top of the ISPS Handa Premiership while last year’s runners-up, Team Wellington, returned to winning ways in the latest round at the weekend.

Also celebrating was Southern United while Tasman United and the Wellington Phoenix Reserves fought out a draw.

In the only match on Saturday, Auckland extended their remarkable winning run to 13 games by edging out fellow title contenders Canterbury United in Christchurch.

Substitute Maro Bonsu-Maro notched the match-winner mid-way through the second half.

That put pressure on Suburbs and Wellington to respond in kind and both duly obliged.

The men from the capital swept aside Hawke’s Bay United 6-3 in an action-packed encounter in Napier while Suburbs also went goal crazy with a 5-1 triumph over 10-man Hamilton Wanderers at home.

With Suburbs having suffered defeat to Auckland City the week before and Hamilton needing the points to keep their play-off hopes alive, the match was expected to be close but Suburbs cruised to victory in the end and Hamilton had largely themselves to blame for much of that. Jordan Shaw picked up a second booking to receive his marching orders which came just past the half-hour mark.

Despite the win, Suburbs have a fight to secure second after Team Wellington bounced back from a mid-season form slump with their high-scoring victory away.

The margin of victory was far tighter in Dunedin but Southern won’t care after carving out their fifth win of the campaign to rise within seven points of the play-off spots. Southern are now dark horses to sneak into the title reckoning as they have a game in hand on fourth-placed Canterbury.

Tasman are well out of the running in third from bottom but continued their recent revival with a draw that extends their unbeaten run to four games.