The eleventh match week of the National Women’s League takes place this weekend, find out what’s in store with the official preview. One match is set to take place on Saturday with Capital hosting Auckland while there are two matches in store on Sunday with Southern United welcoming WaiBOP and the Northern Lights travelling to Central. Canterbury United Pride sit out the action with the bye.

Capital Football vs Auckland Football
Memorial Park, Petone
Saturday 24 November, 2pm
#NWL #CAvAF

Referee: L Robinson
Assistant Referees: B Oosterbaan, H Osborne
Fourth Official: J Williams

Squads

Capital Football: 1. Courtney Norman (GK), 2. Molly Woodhead, 3. Katie Barrott, 4. Danielle Turton, 5. Sarah Alder, 6. Charlotte Wilford-Carroll, 7. Danielle Ohlsson, 8. Anna McPhie, 9. Emma Main, 10. Michaela Robertson, 11. Kennedy Bryant, 12. Tory Schiltgen, 14. Asha Strom, 15. Zoe Barrott, 16. Meisha Boone, 18. Natasha Ingram (GK)
Coach: Emma Evans

Auckland Football: 16. Corina Brown (GK), 2. Kate Carlton, 4. Caitlin Pritchard, 5. Nicole Mettam, 8. Tessa Leong, 9. Jade Parris, 10. Lily Taitimu, 11. Sam Muirhead, 12. Sophie Bradley, 13. Kathryn-Anne Gow, 15. Leah Mettam, 16. Alisha Perry (GK), 18. Emma Phelps, 19. Lucy Carter, 24. Jade Morrissey, 26. Rebecca O’Neill
Coach: Tracy Wrigley

Lowdown

This is the only match involving two sides who can still make the final so most of the weekend’s attention will be focused on Memorial Park, where claiming all three points is a necessity for both teams. Thanks to last week’s late heroics against WaiBOP, Capital’s title hopes are somehow still alive but only just and a loss here would finally stamp them out. Despite being three points off the top two, Auckland’s prospects are much brighter as they have a game in hand on the leading pair and, with first-placed Canterbury having the bye, they would move to within a point of the Pride with a win. A loss would spell trouble though as second-placed Northern are likely to take maximum reward from their trip to Central, requiring Auckland to match their result to stay in touch. Auckland coped well with the absence of their Football Ferns in a comfortable win over Central last week but Capital will provide a much sterner examination of their squad depth, even without a couple of key performers themselves.

Quotes

Emma Evans (Capital coach): “Each game is a must-win for us at this point if we want to make it into the final but I think definitely our focus is on Auckland this week, we’re trying not to look too far into the league. We got a point away to them last time which I think was a pretty good result for us. But that was early in the campaign and it will be interesting to see how this round goes, especially with both teams having a number of players out.”

Tracy Wrigley (Auckland coach): "I think the equation is the same every week, we've known since two weeks ago that our future is in our hands and we just need to continue winning. We're just trying to build the things we need to do to improve as a group and, at the moment, particularly work on things to help build some cohesion."

Southern United vs WaiBOP Football
Forrester Park, Dunedin (please note this differs from the venue originally scheduled)
Sunday 25 November, 11am
#NWL #SUvWB

Referee: W McNeely
Assistant Referees: B Hart, W Dymond
Fourth Official: C Smith

Squads

Southern United: 16. Jordan Woodward (GK), 3. Kelsey Kennard, 4. Mikaela Hunt, 5. Lena de Ronde, 7. Shontelle Smith, 8. Renee Bacon, 9. Chelsea Whittaker, 10. Kirsty Hayr, 11. Coral Seath, 12. Emily Morison, 14. Lara Wall, 18. Ruby Anderson, 20. Britney-Lee Nicholson, 21. Mikayla Gray, 23. Georgia Brown, 24. Jade Middleditch (GK)
Coach: Ignacio Sande

WaiBOP Football: 23. Amy Harrison (GK), 3. Kate Williams, 4. Olivia Hooper, 5. Chloe Henderson, 6. Jayden Watts, 7. Emma Cawte, 8. Stella Neems, 9. Helen Talbot, 10. Ella Golding, 11. Lilly Muspratt, 13. Tiana Hill, 14. Richlyn Tuhoro, 15. Grace Cox, 19. Ashley Weld, 20. Chelsea Elliott, 21. Rylee Godbold (GK)
Coach: Michael Mayne

Lowdown

There is nothing riding on this game in terms of the title race but there will be no lack of motivation from either side as they both still have much to play for. WaiBOP will be desperate to avoid the wooden spoon and, with fellow contenders Central expected to take nothing from their clash against title-chasing Northern, the visitors will see this as a good opportunity to haul themselves away from bottom spot. Southern meanwhile will be disappointed not to have made a stronger push for the title and will be keen to prove they do in fact possess the talent to have been more relevant in that regard. They now have back-to-back games against the two lowest-placed sides in the league and a pair of comprehensive victories would underline that. They are one of the few sides to have been spared by international call-ups and will be looking to make full use of that against a WaiBOP outfit still without coach Michael Mayne and several star players in Kelli Brown, Grace Wisnewski and Georgia Candy.

Quotes

Stuart Moffatt (Southern assistant coach): “Before having the bye last week, we had a string of quite near losses to the top teams. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to put away our chances and teams higher than us in the league put away theirs better than we did. We’re looking to rectify that and be more clinical in our approach. With three more games to go, we’re looking to pick up as many points as we can to finish on a high.”

Jasmine Quilligan (WaiBOP acting head coach): “Despite the result, I think the Capital game has proven that we can compete, we are good enough to score and are capable of getting results against the teams further up the table. I’ll be interested to see how we go against another side that, like us, is out of finals contention. If we can keep our mentality right and put in another solid, collective effort for the full 90-plus minutes, then I think we’ll do well against Southern.”

Central Football vs Northern Lights
Massey University, Palmerston North
Sunday 25 November, 1pm
#NWL #CEvNL

Referee: A Turner
Assistant Referees: B Walker, D Crawford
Fourth Official: J Marshall

Squads

Central Football: 1. Amelia Simmers (GK), 2. Freya Partridge-Moore, 3. Jenna Barry, 4. Jana Niedermayr, 5. Maggie Pedersen, 6. Sophie Crewe, 7. Lydia Bamford, 8. Tyler Wood, 9. Mikaela Boxall, 10. Jessica Mason, 11. Casey Ralph, 12. Kate Watson, 14. Kate Mori, 15. Charlotte Lancaster, 16. Aimee Atkins, 18. Aoife Gallagher-Forbes (GK)
Coaches: Matt Kilsby/Barry Scullion

Northern Lights: 1. Lily Alfeld (GK), 2. Alaina Granger, 3. Greer MacIntosh, 4. Emma Turnbull, 5. Saskia Vosper, 6. Nicole Stratford, 7. Talisha Green, 8. Dayna Stevens, 9. Ava Pritchard, 10. Niamh Quann, 11. Helena Kelderman, 12. Liz Savage, 14. Jane Barnett, 15. Vegas McCaroll, 16. Hannah Reddy, 18. Emily Couchman (GK)
Coach: Gemma Lewis

Lowdown

With leaders Canterbury having the bye and fellow title rivals Auckland facing a tough trip to Capital, this is a golden opportunity for Northern to take a big step towards a place in the final. Even with a squad shorn of many important players, they should still have the quality to make sure they don’t shoot themselves in the foot as Central are still rooted to the bottom of the table and have not won for over a month. While clearly lacking the quality and experience to compete with the top sides, Central are not the sort of team to throw in the towel though and will make the Lights work hard for the points, as they did last week at Auckland. They were eventually defeated 4-0 by the defending champions but frustrated them for long periods and it took a rapid-fire burst of goals mid-way through the second half for Auckland to make sure of the win. Central have the bye in the final round so are nearly at the end of their season with only one match remaining after this.

Quotes

Donald Piper (Central assistant coach): “I guess it’s a case of two squads trying to do different things. Northern are pressing hard to finish top of the table and for our squad we’re just trying to improve on our previous performances. So there’s two different outlooks but we’ll approach the game with our usual outlook of working hard, trying to be combative and earning the right to play. We’re up against a Northern squad full of talented players so it will be another stern test but one that we look forward to. It will be good to be at home because we haven’t played there in a month.”

Shane Verma (Northern assistant coach): “We just have to focus on ourselves now and make sure we don’t rely on anyone else to get the results we need. We’ve got two big games and a bye left with three weeks to go so our fate is in our own hands. Central have been improving week-on-week so they’ll give us a tough challenge, we just have to prepare like any other game. They’re quite a young team but they have some very good players we have to watch out for.”

BYE – Canterbury United Pride

Article added: Friday 23 November 2018