Riverside First Half Blows City Away and Ulverstone set to be test against Rangers.

Antonio Macri prepares to go forward for City.

A Dominant first half from Riverside and a couple of key goal keeper errors gave Riverside a handy 3 goal lead at half time of the first game of round three in the Steve Hudson Cup.

Ryan McCaragher scored first for Riverside when David Smith in Launceston City’s goal fumbled a shot and allowed McCaragher a tap in.

A similar slip from the usually safe hands of Smith gifted Oliver Edmonson of Riverside his first goal of the cup.  To cap off a stellar first half from Olympic Nick Lanau-Atkinson scored direct form a free kick to put Riverside ahead 3-0 at the half time break.

Riverside continued to dominate the possession and the shot count, but couldn’t break through the City defense in the second half.

In the remaining games of round three, Ulverstone will come up against Northern Rangers, in what should be an entertaining and enlightening match at 11am on Sunday morning.

 A win to Ulverstone will all but secure them a birth in the final, most likely against South Hobart who sits this week out with the bye.  Ulverstone will be excited by their preseason form, and coach Nick Owen said in the Advocate earlier in the month “There is a sense of excitement and expectation around the club this year, the pressure is on to deliver”.  

"We have a strong enough squad to really have a crack at the title this season."

If the feeling and vibe is correct, this Sunday would be a great opportunity to get the physiological edge on Northern Rangers, who have held the wood over Ulverstone for some time now.

Rangers will look to fine tune their line up in preparation for 2012 NPL kick off, and this week’s side looks to be close to full strength for the Rangers.  The sides will match up well and this promises to be a good contest.  Rangers will welcome into their line up another new signing in Mitch Duffy for this week’s clash and gain back the services of Mark Ambrose.

Newtown Eagles will but heads with Prospect Knights, the last time they met was in the State Wide Championship series, where Newtown came away with a win that lead to a birth in the final against South Hobart.  This week’s sides will look very different though, with Steve Pitchford only having 7 of his assumed senior players available to travel North for the contest.  The Cup is over for both sides, but the rather large carrot is the opportunity to get of the foot of the table, and avoid a win-less cup campaign.  Last place will sit the final week out of course, so a win almost secure the side a valuable practice match before the season proper.

Prospect had last week off, and all eyes will turn to them to see if anymore of their Premiership players have returned since their embarrassing 6-1 loss to Launceston United.

The final match will be at 3pm when Launceston United come up against Glenorchy Knights.  Knights coach Chris Hey was full for praise for Launceston in his interview with Walter Pless, and expects a tough match against a revitalised Launceston United.

Mark Egan has adopted a rotation policy for Launceston United, one can only hope it does not include Thors Nimely who has been in sensational goal scoring form, and will be key for the Blues if they are to stand a chance of getting over Glenorchy this weekend.

This Weekends matches:

11:00am Ulverstone Vs Northern Rangers

1:00pm Newtown Eagles Vs Prospect Knights

3:00pm L’ton United Vs Glenorchy Knights