Northern 1 v Spirit 4 - Apr 4th
 

Scottish import Barry Gardiner can be justifiably satisfied with his debut game as player coach of Spirit FC as he netted two of the goals that helped his team to a convincing 4-1 win over Northern in their opening Football South premier league clash at Dunedin on Saturday.

The afternoon began with a sombre note as all players sported black arm-bands and stood for a moments silence of respect for Northern’s long serving club stalwart Ron Little who died earlier in the week.

However that’s where Spirit’s cooperation with the home team ended as from the opening whistle it dominated play; set up a series of chances and within twenty five minutes had established a 3-nil lead.

It was Gardiner who opened the scoring at the eleven minute mark when he latched on to a deflected save from Northern keeper Nick Grant and drove the ball across the face of goal into the far corner of the net.

One in the back for the Scottish laddie...hmmm I'm not sure I worded that very well

Six minutes later after good mid field build up Gardiner took the ball to the by-line and with clinical accuracy cut it back to Morgan McCarrison who angled his shot through a bevy of Northern defenders to put Spirit 2-nil ahead.

Morgan has a wee peek to see if in fact it did go in....it did

With their confidence on a high the Spirit players continued to press home their advantage and when skipper Brendon Lloyd lofted the ball forward to Gardiner who beat the off-side trap to slot his second goal Spirit edged out to a 3-nil lead.

Badger turns to shoot

In the mean time Spirit’s defence led by a player-of-the-day performance from Dion Cameron was coping well with Northern’s attacking moves from which its best chance was a breakaway by Tim Smith.
Smith squandered the golden opportunity when he shot well wide of an open Spirit goal.

Northern’s second real chance was more fruitful though and Seamus Gray in a similar position to Smith made no mistake cutting Spirit’s lead back to 3-1 with a fine goal.

The half time break was a welcome relief for the players who had battled well in the balmy heat of the afternoon.

Any idea Northern had of reducing Spirit’s lead further in the second spell were dealt a blow just 2 minutes into the half when Carl Henderson out-sprinted the Northern defence and slotted his first goal for Spirit FC restoring the team’s 3 goal advantage.

Carl carefully lines up this attempted volley....no luck this time though

The heat and early season fitness condition began to take its toll on most players and the game deteriorated as a spectacle. Spirit continued to dominate but struggled to beat Northern’s off-side defensive strategy.

There were plenty of Northern defenders about most of the time
Just noticed the blonde guy got into 3 of the 5 pics
Could be I'm attracted to blondes....!!!!

By full-time the Spirit players were satisfied they had gone a long way to redeeming themselves for the 6-1 thrashing Northern handed them in the equivalent game last season.

Old Boys captured the local pre-season cup when it beat the cup holders Queens Park 2-nil at Waverley Park.
Both teams won two of their three games; however Old Boys claimed the cup with a superior goal difference.

Top of Page