KEY POINTS:
NZFC
Auckland City - 4
YoungHeart Manawatu - 1
With Waitakere United jetting off to play in the Club World Cup on Friday night, Auckland City slipped out of the limelight for the first time in the history of the NZFC.
On the evidence of what they are achieving under new coach Colin Tuaa, however, it doesn't seem long before they will be back in it.
Yesterday they continued their unbeaten start to the season, picking up their fifth win in six games to move to the top of the table.
It is a very different side to the one that won their third NZFC title in as many years last season but in the wash-up of player exchanges with Waitakere, Tuaa has pieced together a capable side.
Yesterday they overcame a slow start to go on a goal-scoring spree in the second half that could well have extended beyond four.
"We have had a lot of changes [to the squad this season] and today we tried some different things," captain Ben Sigmund said. "It didn't really work for us in the first half but, sh*t, if a team like that can come out and score four goals in the second half, we must be doing all right."
What they are doing is trying to play an attractive style of football. Tuaa likes his players to pass the ball forward rather than hoof it.
It doesn't always work out that way but is often good to watch through the likes of Bryan Little, Keryn Jordan, Ki-Hyung Lee, Jeff Campbell and Sigmund.
"I'm very pleased," Tuaa said. "We are still a relatively new group and we're still trying to find the best combinations, the right 11. To be able to mix things up from week to week and still get results has been great because we will only get better as the season goes."
Manawatu will have to get better. They are still a tidy side with good players in the shape of the two Ians, Robinson and Sandbrook, as well as New Zealand under-20 midfielder Nick Roydhouse.
But it's clearly not clicking for them this season as they linger in the unfamiliar surrounds of the bottom half of the table.
"Maybe we need a few more dogs," Manawatu coach Shane Rufer said. "We are a very calm, quiet group. In the first half [against Auckland], we played well but in the second, we lost our shape. I wouldn't say we folded but we succumbed to the pressure.
"I still know we have a good team. We will probably have to win every game now to get into the playoffs, which with this group of players is not out of the question, but it will be tough."
Rufer saw his side take the lead in the 12th minute through Sandbrook, whose left-foot shot from outside the box rifled past Auckland goalkeeper Tamati Williams. By halftime, the voice of Manawatu's lone supporter sounded the loudest.
But Sigmund's headed goal from a 60th-minute corner got the ball rolling and Auckland added another three in 19 minutes through Jordan, Lee and Campbell.
They were all goals of high quality: Jordan scooped his left-footed shot over the advancing Michael Utting, Lee blasted a free kick in off the post and Campbell's first-time left-foot strike rounded off a slick move he started. Tuaa will hope they can find that sort of form when they travel to Wellington next Saturday in a top-of-the-table clash.
In other games yesterday, Hawke's Bay remain fourth in the NZFC after beating Canterbury 2-1, while the New Zealand under-17 women's side went down 2-1 to South Korea in Auckland.
