KEY POINTS:
As the Chatham Cup, one of the oldest of New Zealand's sporting trophies, struggles to recapture its glory days, the breathtaking efforts of Kevin Fallon's Mt Albert Grammar School side are a godsend.
Their run, now through to the fourth round (last 16), may well end in a week when they tackle cup-holders Central United. Fallon and his team are determined to give it their all in chasing an unprecedented quarter-final spot.
To do that they must reverse last year's third-round 5-0 away loss to Central. Not an easy ask.
But Fallon is backing the youthful exuberance that players like Dakota Lucas, Pomare Te Anau, Zane Sole, Adam Cowen, Mark Withers, Jonathan Raj and Skye Parmenter bring to give it their best shot.
Lucas, one of the players in his first year in the team, is thriving under Fallon's tutelage. After missing the preliminary round cup win over Okaihau/Kaeo, Lucas has failed to score only in his debut when he played 77 minutes before being substituted.
In nine games since, Lucas has scored 19 goals including four in the 19-0 first-round Auckland Secondary School Knockout Cup win over Waiheke High and hat-tricks in two senior A1 school matches. He also scored two in the 6-0 first-round Chatham Cup win over Western Springs, one next up in the 5-4 win over Fencibles United and both in last weekend's 2-0 third-round win over Mangere United.
But even that was not enough to guarantee a start for tomorrow's school game against Macleans College. Fallon has opted to leave him and defensive linchpin Adam Cowen - another newcomer this year - on the bench as they have been in Wellington this week training with the national under-20 squad and have missed their daily dose of early morning work at the school.
Fallon must also put the side out for a catch-up school game at Rangitoto College on Tuesday. Such a heavy workload doesn't faze him.
"We have the players to do the job," said Fallon. "We take it a game at a time and keep working."
While the odds suggest their Chatham Cup chances aren't great - Central are, after all, the leading team in the Northern Regional Premier League and have some battle-hardened players - Fallon is not giving up.
"If you win this one, you could win the cup," said Fallon. "Arguably, they [Central] are the best club side in the country. But, the more I think about it, it is great we have got this far. I know the school will be right behind us."
And, after four away games, this time they will have home advantage in their battle to beat the odds.
Fallon has not always won favour with his sometimes abrupt manner but no one would ever question his passion or technical and tactical appreciation of the game.
"MAGS have been very good to me," said Fallon, acknowledging there have been a few incidents along the way in a coaching career stretching back to 1974 at Gisborne City. "Being involved at a school means I have to have better control on things.
"You have to learn from your mistakes. Sometimes you regret some things."
Fallon is often seen away from the sideline preferring, at least for home games, to view from afar.
"I don't have to be barking at my players. My team is pretty self-motivated."
And, he insists, he will change nothing for this date with destiny, giving the players carte blanche freedom to play as they have all season.
In the mid-1980s, while still in Gisborne and after his flirt with the big time as John Adshead's assistant in the epic 1982 World Cup campaign, Fallon started early morning training sessions with his older son Sean.
Those before-dawn sessions have continued with many of the best players - boys and girls - leaving home comforts for an hour or so of regimented football under Fallon's gaze.
He was employed fulltime by former headmaster Greg Taylor in 1997 to head the successful school's academy. Fallon takes most satisfaction from seeing his former players succeed at higher levels, after helping bring back the glory days the school enjoyed in the late 1920s when they won the first of 35 senior school league championships and more recently a host of Knockout Cups and national titles.
He estimates that between 500 and 600 pupils have passed through the academy system at the Alberton Ave school, including some who have gone on to play for the All Whites or professionally around the world.
He has already tasted Chatham Cup success as player-coach-captain of the Nelson United side who upset hot favourites Mt Wellington 1-0 in 1977.
Thirtysomething years on, Fallon refuses to think about the possibility of winning the cup again, but come next Saturday, he will put out a team - hardly a ragtag bunch of schoolkids - to win against Central United, a club he once coached before they booted him out.
