Pacific Premiership going down to wire

SCORING TOUCH: Gisborne United will hope that Josh Harris (left) and Jarom Brouwer continue their purple patch of goalscoring. United play Napier Marist Reserves in the Pacific Premiership in Napier tomorrow. Picture by Liam Clayton

It’s the penultimate round of football’s Pacific Premiership with only three sides left with a chance to win — Gisborne United, Gisborne Thistle and Taradale.

Competition leaders Heavy Equipment Services United play their last two games in Hawke’s Bay. Tomorrow they play seventh-placed Napier Marist Reserves at Park Island.

In this season’s third round, United had a comfortable 3-0 win but in Round 13 last season, in their home fixture, Marist demolished United 5-1.

United player-coach Corey Adams has a near-full squad; young rightback Lucian Nickerson is unavailable.

Adams is wary of Marist in Napier, as they have youth on their side and can pull players from their first team.

Adams wants his side to keep the ball and take their chances early.

“I think we’ve been playing attractive football this year, so we’ll look to continue that trend,” he said.

He knows that if United win this weekend they are only one win away from the title, so they are pumped for a big effort.

Second-placed Gisborne Vehicle Testing Thistle play bottom side Hastings Western Rangers at Childers Road Reserve. Rangers have managed only one win this season and are 29 points behind Thistle, who have the second-best goal difference, plus 27, whereas Western Rangers have a negative goal difference of 36.

In Hawke’s Bay, Thistle scored six against Rangers and last season had a 3-1 win at home.

Coach Garrett Blair has two definite changes to make to his line-up tomorrow as Fabio Senna has returned home to Brazil and Matt McVey is preparing for a change in jobs and is unavailable.

Blair knows he has class and cover across the field and can play some players in multiple positions.

Thistle love to play at home, with good support, excellent resources and a great clubroom providing a great atmosphere.

But Blair knows that in this league you have to be on your game in the away fixtures as well, and get the necessary results to be successful.

Blair still wants to take each game as it comes, concentrating on tomorrow’s fixture first, then think about next week’s final game against Napier Marist.

“Our focus will be on what we can control,” he said.

“If other games go our way, great. If they don’t, so be it, that’s football. United are a class side, with many players who have won this league before and they have been in this situation before, on the verge of winning the league, so they will be well aware of the pressure.”

Thistle kick off at 2.30pm at Childers Road Reserve and United kick off at 3pm in Napier.

In the curtain-raiser to the Pacific Premiership game, the 2019 Bailey Cup final between United’s Gisborne Championship team and Gisborne Boys’ High School will kick off at midday.

We should be expecting a good crowd for the top Gisborne division cup final.

The two teams met just last Saturday in their Division 1 clash, with United winning 8-3.

United will be looking for a better result than last season, when they were beaten by Thistle Massive 7-0 in the final.

Player-coach Stu Cranswick is looking for a big game from his side who are coming into the match confident, but knowing their opposition will run all day.

United have class throughout the team with most players having had some first-team experience in their careers, and will look to the class of veterans Craig Christophers and centreback Jimmy Holden.