Soccer: Halswell relishing home ground semifinal

Halswell United coach Wayne Burt is banking on home pitch advantage and the Halswell community to help inspire his team on the greatest day of the soccer club's 41-year history.

The Mainland Premier League side are rated rank outsiders to beat Auckland glamour club Central United in Sunday's Chatham Cup semifinal at Halswell Domain.

Central will field former All Whites Ross Nicholson and Paul Urlovic and ex-South African striker Grant Young.

Most of their starting eleven were part of Auckland City's victorious national league team who competed in the Oceania club championships in Tahiti in June.

Goalkeeper Nicholson (twice), striker Urlovic, defender Greg Uhlmann and co-coach Bill Harris won Chatham Cup medals with Central in 1997 and 1998.

But Burt and his players are unfazed by their assignment.

"Central has got some big names, but we've taken a bit of of encouragement from the fact that they've lost their last two (northern) league games, 3-0," Burt said.

"It shows to us they are not invincible. We've obviously got to play the game or our lives and hope that Central have another bit of an off-day and rely on our home pitch and the crowd to give us that emotional roller-coaster ride that we've had on the road to the Chatham Cup semifinal."

Halswell had 1000 fans to their quarterfinal win over Papakura last month and Burt said there has been a "real buzz" about the village.

Halswell has the advantage of knowing they can go the distance. Three of their five Cup victories have been achieved after extra time.

Unlike Central, Halswell are still in the hunt for a league title this year. But the Cup is their sole focus this weekend.

"This possibly mean more to a small club like Halswell to be in a semifinal," Burt said.

"We realise it has taken Halswell 41 years to get to the semifinals and it might be another 41 years, so we are going to give it our best shot."

- nzpa