Skipper uncovers plenty in reserve

Maungakaramea captain Tania Crene wasn't exactly brimming with optimism on Friday night looking ahead to their premier-grade game with Whangarei Girls' High School on Saturday.
Her resident Black Stick, Anna Thorpe, was away on national duty and Crene could  round up only 10 regular players for the match, forcing her to arrange cover from the reserve team for the important  clash with the second-placed side.
"It was all a little bit stressful but we somehow managed to pull it together," she said.
Maungakaramea struggled through a goalless first spell before Natalie Child and Holly Nichol found the net to give them a well-deserved 2-0 victory.
Crene said WGHS were excellent in the midfield and dominated possession at times but failed to penetrate the circle with the same level of control.
"Our defence played well - and it's a pretty new-looking defence - they scrambled well and did a lot of running but to be honest it could have gone either way," she said.
"On paper, we shouldn't have won but really it was a case of making the most of the scoring opportunities we had in the circle."
The four or five remaining players in the Maungakaramea side that had been so strong  in recent years gave the team a slight edge in a tight match.
"It's been a rebuilding year for us and we're still doing better than I thought we'd be doing at this stage. We're second on the table now and we're winning games I didn't think we'd be winning."
The win moves Maungakaramea into second place behind runaway leaders Old Girls, who beat Kamo High School 2-0 in the later game on Saturday.
Old Girls' coach Alan Lints said the side scored both goals before halftime but, rather than going on the defensive, the student team came out firing in the second half.
"The (KHS) girls are improving every game and they really opened  things up in the second half, making it an end-to-end game," Lints said.
Young KHS goalkeeper Lani Hewson made a number of good saves at close range while Old Girls' central defender Elley Miller's strong tackling was responsible  for halting a number of KHS scoring chances.
Lints said both goals  were scored by Laura Douglas, who was playing herself into form.
"We have been guilty of being over-reliant on Laura in the past but now the rest of the team are settling into the season well and that's taking some of the pressure off her and she's responding by coming into form," he said.
KHS coach Donna Ford said her team were more competitive  than they had been for years and they just had to eliminate the "little lapses" that were costing them the opportunity of upsetting the top teams.
The men's premier teams continued their six-aside competition over the weekend with the 11-a-side competition back under way again at the beginning of August.