Friday 18 July 2014

Some Cracking Games This Weekend

Firstly the game between Launceston City V Rangers V League game has been changed to NTCA due to Mitsubishi Park being closed.
Does this mean that Prospect Park is also closed for the Knights V Devonport game tomorrow???
Conditions up on the coast over the last 24 hours has been so windy that the grounds are all bone dry and will need watering tonight to keep green.

Somerset V Riverside 2:30pm Shark Park
This is the game of the round by far. Alot say that this is the game will decide the title but i disagree as there are still alot of games left and there are a few other clubs out there that could match it with these guys come end of the season.
Both clubs will know what is at stake tomorrow and a loss will make Riverside's last part of the season very hard due to 2 draws and Somerset have 2 games in hand.
Somerset will be with out a few big names this week and will no doubt have enough talent in their camp to cover these people.
Kyrone Johnson who missed last time is playing and with him and Chris Smith who is now playing on the feild will be looking to demolish Rivers defence. Smith who is in great form and has scored in all games since he has been on the field.
Nigel Brown said this" This week is the match of the season so far when we host ladder leaders Olympic at Shark Park.
We will be missing our centre back, Elliott Stewart who is suffering a broken toe and may miss a few weeks. Captain Keegan Wells has work commitments and he may also miss this week.
We managed to train on the pitch this week and it should be right for the weekend now the rain has stopped. Championship teams have a habit of winning both the difficult games and the games when things aren't going well, Olympic have proved this all year and while last weeks 1-0 win over City probably wasn't pretty they still got the 3 points, similar to the match I watched at Montello several weeks ago.
They certainly won't roll over and let's us win, we will need to be at 100%.

Wayne Penfold  would be looking forward to this clash and have his troops fully firing and said this"The much anticipated Top of the Table clash against Somerset awaits us this week. Its a crucial game in the title race and a win from either team puts them in a commanding position to win the Premiership.
We welcome back Chris Wademan this week, as he returns from suspension after collecting 5 yellow cards. Nic Lunnon is the unlucky player to miss out.  Especially considering he had an outstanding game last week. Otherwise there are no changes.

There are some people questioning our results and wondering how we are undefeated after watching a few of our games. I think all of the players will agree that we haven't perhaps been playing to our full potential. But sometimes you have to win ugly and grind out victories.

Somerset have been winning, and winning well, but we don't fear them. We beat them with 10 men earlier in the year and are the only team to really test them. They have some good players with Stewart, Smith and the Johnson boys. In saying that though, we also have a team of really good players. We have a belief within our squad that we can get the right result. Its a tough challenge to play at Cardigan St with their vocal crowd. Lets just hope we can keep them silent.

Launceston United V Ulverstone 2:30pm Birch Ave
After coming of a massive win away last week United would be firm faveroutes at home this week against the Reds. Have United found the form that on paper they should be acheiving?
Ulverstone have had an up and down seeason and due to lack of numbers it has shown this year, Connor Meanie has had an up and down season through injury and suspension and will need to fire this week to have a hope of the Reds getting a win. Ceddric Cox-Haines was sent of last week and that will fill a big hole in the Reds defence.

Knights V Devonport 2:30pm Prospect Park
Nathan Balym celebrates game 300 this week and this should be eough to get the Knifghts up and about for the win. Also in the back of their minds they still will b e thinking of finals and will be pressing hard to try and topple Devonport to get closer to the 4 and to knock Devonport out.
Ray Heald said this"Rhys Kinslow and Mitch Duffy out this week, from the senior squad both have work commitments, the wet weather hasn’t been kind  having no access to our grounds for training.
Round 1 Match against Devonport was not a good day for the club, we will be looking for a much better commitment from the players tomorrow  
 
Nathan Balym plays his 300 games this week, congratulations Nathan a player that works just as hard behind the scenes as he does on the ground.

Rangers V Burnie United 2:30pm Sunday
This game is just as important as the Somerset V Riverside game due to this game and a loss to Devonport will start shaping the top 4.
Burnie have been in great form as of late and lead by their skipper Andy Gibson. Ray Parke will have his boys all tuned in and will be looking at keeping their run going and positioning them selves come finals.
Rangers also are keeping their final alive and this week have a few more senior players returning to strenghten thier squad.
Coch Litchendonk said this"Another big game for us against Burnie at the NTCA on Sunday.  We were able to get over Burnie earlier in the year at Montello which is a tough game to win, but this game will be crucial, lose it and its curtains for our season, win it and we are in with a big shot of the finals, our boys know it, we just have to win each game in front of us at the moment, and if we do that we will play finals.

Burnie are a tough physical side, and we like that, and feel we will match up with them well, but might have a little more pace and legs around the ground on a bigger pitch than what they will be accustomed to.

We again wont know our final line up until after the Victory League match on Friday night, but either way we should have a strong team on the park.

We need to be really careful with our Victory League list at the moment, with probably three of our most promising under 20 players on the side lines with injuries that will rule them out for the year, Alex Fulton, Dylan Headland and Chris Collins are all gone after taking big hits against big strong sides this year, so we will make sure we have bodies on the park that can both play football and handle themselves physically too.

I don't care what anyone says, this idea of developing your best young players against full grown men in their twilight has balls on it.

Adam McIntyre, Stef Hamilton and Mohommad Alkhazraj are all back in the starting line up, these boys were sorely missed against Prospect, they all play high pressure football, throw everything they have at the challenge and leave nothing to chance, for McIntyre and Hamilton particularly coming up under Andrew Brown from Clarence, epitomise a pressing physical style of play, and they drag the rest of the team with them, Mohommad combines that with finesse and he can be unpredictable in the final third, I'm looking forward to seeing these boys back in our side and combing with the other lads and executing some fast paced passing football.

What ever side we have for the match, we know we will get a battle, Andy Gibson, Stuart Batt and in particular Burnie's keeper Brad Ryan are quality players, and Ray Parke demands a lot of his players, and they seem to have responded well this year, pushing out some terrific results for the Burnie United Football Club, we certainly respect them, but we know if we stick to our style of play, we can match it with the best in the league.

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