The last time these two teams met was in the Chatham Cup quarter-final in late July, when Christchurch United, playing at home, blew a 2-0 lead with ten minutes to go and ultimately lost 4-2 after extra time.

On a relatively nice and only mildly windy Saturday afternoon at Petone Memorial Park began a brand new National League season... and immediately we saw an upset.

Will this be the season that a team from outside Auckland wins the Women’s National League? You never know - there are no foregone conclusions here.

The regional leagues are over and the cups are complete. Now it’s time for the main event: the New Zealand National League.

It’s been Auckland United vs West Coast Rangers all season for the trophy in these parts. Auckland United won their first six games in a row before losing 2-0 away to Rangers. WCR went on to win their first nine games in a row but…

Which brings us to the most important game of the week: Tauranga Moana vs Hibiscus Coast. If Tauranga won, they’d secure their spot in the top division for another year at HC’s expense. If the Coasties won, they’d go ahead of Tauranga on goal difference

It was semi-final weekend for both of our national cup competitions with the last four clubs in the pots scrapping it out for a trip to North Harbour Stadium.

The shenanigans in the latest round of Men’s Northern League were almost indescribable but let’s do our best because this much craziness ought to be recorded for posterity.

The inevitability of Wellington Olympic means it’s only a matter of when, not if, they clinch their fifth consecutive Central League championship. They were away against the Wellington Phoenix Reserves who had their Aussie Cup reps back for this game.

The cup stuff swung back around this weekend as the last eight clubs in the Chatham Cup were chiselled into four. Gotta start with the defending champions Wellington Olympic, who faced Western Suburbs in a Central League duel at Endeavour Park.

There’s nothing quite like a good old top of the table bonanza. That’s what we got at Shepherds Park on Saturday when Birkenhead United hosted Western Springs seeking to reclaim the first place badge that they’d been wearing for most of the season

Sound the bells because we have a new leader in the Men’s Northern League…

What do ya know, the old mates at Auckland FC have made another couple of reserves signings. They already added Benjamin Perez Baldoni (15, Ellerslie) and Nathan Martin (17, Fencibles) a few weeks back and in the last few days…

Let us begin at the summit, where Birkenhead United have been hanging out for a couple of months. Birko remain first after this week’s fixtures... but the lead has been narrowed after they only drew 3-3 against West Coast Rangers.

It was only a fortnight ago that the previous cup rounds took place but the games keep flowing so it was time for third round fixtures in both the Chatham Cup and Kate Sheppard Cup

Dunedin City Royals had won seven outta seven heading into this week but a trip to face Cashmere Technical away posed one of their trickiest fixtures yet. Nevertheless, they did in this game what they did in all the other games.

It was a long weekend and it was a very busy weekend. We had cup games all over the country and somehow the Northern League managed to squeeze in a full round of fixtures on top of that

Another unbeaten record has fallen. Christchurch United have been looking imperious this year but they got popped 2-1 by Coastal Spirit on Sunday in a crazy finish.

Auckland United have done the business at the Oceania Champions League. Having progressed easily through the group stage, they met Henderson Eels (Solomon Islands) in the semis and scored three times in the opening seven minutes…