Hockey: Southerners miss chances

Canterbury coach Andrew Hastie was left shaking his head after his team blew good halftime leads to lose 3-5 to Auckland and North Harbour in two key men's NHL matches over the weekend.

The losses left the southerners in fourth place and facing a testing final week with four matches, including a catch-up against Midlands in Christchurch on Wednesday and a tough final round-robin clash with Wellington a day later.

Auckland continue to set the pace and head south for the end-of-season deciders with a one point lead over defending champions North Harbour, who bounced back from their 2-1 loss to Wellington on Saturday to beat Canterbury at Crown Relocations Stadium yesterday.

Auckland dropped their first points yesterday when held 2-2 by Wellington.

Auckland midfielder Ryan Archibald continued his comeback to his best form by scoring one goal against Canterbury on Saturday and two against Wellington.

Archibald opened the scoring after three minutes yesterday when he drove home. Wellington equalised 25 minutes later when Grant Down deflected home a penalty corner. Archibald replied in a like manner six minutes into the second spell for 2-1, but inspirational Australian centre-half Brent Livermore pounced a minute later to level it at 2-2.

On Saturday, Canterbury led 3-1 at one stage against Auckland before Archibald closed the gap in scoring just before halftime. Held scoreless in the second half, the visitors conceded goals to Dharmesh Puna, Simon Child and Taine Bennett to lose for the first time this season.

In a replay of last year's final, North Harbour and Canterbury turned in another goalfest yesterday.

Again, Canterbury failed to score after the break. Andrew Nation gave Canterbury the early advantage. Simon Brill equalised before Hayden Shaw struck twice.

The home side got one back through man of the match Ben Collier, who lifted the ball over goalkeeper Michael Bevin early in the second spell, and drew level when Shane Maddaford played a ball in and was on hand to drive home when it was not cleared.

Goals to Blair Hopping - who smashed home after a direct hit from a Zac Hawes penalty corner attempt rebounded - and David Kosoof - who scored from close range after the ball ran loose - completed the comeback.

Northland kept their faint top four hopes alive with a loss and a win.

After being upset by Southern 2-1 on Saturday, the northerners bounced back yesterday to beat Central 2-0 with two Scott Heappey strokes.

Midlands scored their first win yesterday in another eight-goal thriller. Ahead 4-3 at halftime, Midlands scored the only goal of the second spell to win 5-3, the third such result of the weekend.

The seedings for next weekend's play-offs will be decided on Thursday when all teams, men and women, will play their final pool matches in Christchurch. The feature games will be the Auckland v North Harbour (men) and Wellington v Canterbury (women) clashes.