November 26 saw a home round of matches against the Mountain Majik club – played at Stromlo High due to the unavailability of the regular home court at the AIS.
The Mountain Majik club have been in the top division for a number seasons and are a mid table club with strong teams throughout their nine competitive age groups. It was expected though that the club would take a few wins from the day – but as it has been throughout this season to date, the youngest age groups struggled against stronger Sydney opposition, and it was up to the older age groups to bring home some points.
A terrific win from the Open Women and draws-which-should-have-been-wins from both the open age men and youth men rounded out the day. The 17 girls again played strongly, but just couldn’t kick up a gear to get the necessary goals to take their match. The other age groups were soundly outplayed – even though they managed to put together strong periods of play – it was not enough to remain competitive throughout the entire forty minutes.
With one more round of the first half of the season to play – against the South Coast Taipans at home – it is hoped that the competitive teams can string together a few wins to start off a more positive second half to the season.
Don’t forget to check out the photos of Match Day 6 at the Boomerangs photo site.
A short summary of the weekend’s results:
12 boys – Boomerangs 1 – 7 Majik (HT 1-4)
13 girls – Boomerangs 2 – 6 Majik (HT 1-3)
14 boys – Boomerangs 2 – 8 Majik (HT 1-6)
15 girls – Boomerangs 1 – 6 Majik (HT 0-1)
16 boys – Boomerangs 2 – 6 Majik (HT 1-4)
17 girls – Boomerangs 1 – 2 Majik (HT 1-1)
Youth men – Boomerangs 2 – 2 Majik (HT 1-0)
Open Women – Boomerangs 4 – 0 Majik (HT 1-0)
Open Men – Boomerangs 4 – 4 Majik (HT 0-1)
Following is the write up of the men’s match by Dan De Nardi of Football NSW.
Round six of the 2016/17 Football NSW Select NSW Premier League threw up another bout of excitement as Enfield beat Inner West 5-2, Dural edged Mascot 4-3, UTS pipped South Coast 2-1, while Boomerangs and Mountain Majik fought out a 4-4 draw.
The top four certainly got a lot tighter as Inner West (13), Enfield (12), UTS (10) and Dural (10) inched ahead of Mascot (7), Boomerangs (6) and the Mountaineers (6) – and the closeness of the competition is overstated by a gripping win-margin average.
This season’s scoreline gap between teams is an average margin of 2.1 goals, tighter than the next closest season 2009/10 when 2.5 was the average winning margin and significantly tighter than the long-term league average of 2.8 goals.
To show how much more even the premier league has become since forming 10 years ago, the average winning margin in 2008/09 was 3.1 goals.
And on an individual front Enfield’s Shervin Adeli bagged four goals to join on-fire Daniel Fogarty on seven goals for the summer; but 20 players have scored three or more goals to all be in Golden Boot contention.
South Coast Taipans 1 (Matt Mazevski) UTS Northside 2 (Alex Apanian, Grant Lynch)
Boomerangs FS 4 (Jonathan Ciminelli, Michael Rinaudo, Nicholas Rathjen 2) Mountain Majik 4 (Chris Barbera, Manuel Duarte, Jordan Guerreiro, Samuel Gulisano)
Enfield Rovers 5 (Shervin Adeli 4, Dominic Cox) Inner West Magic 2 (Daniel Fogarty, Daniel Fornito)
Dural Warriors 4 (Nathan Niski, Bruno Pivato, Glen Kelshaw, Brandon Vella) Mascot Vipers 3 (Leonardo Pinto, Shu Torihara, Mohammad Dubdub)
Boomerangs level with Mountain
Boomerangs FS and Mountain Majik battled out an epic 4-4 at Stromlo High, the visitors scoring twice in the last 50 seconds to share the spoils.
A Manuel Duarte goal for Majik was all that separated the two sides at the changeover but Boomerangs leveled soon after the break, Jordan Guerreiro restoring Mountain’s advantage minutes later only to see the home side back on even terms in an instant.
Majik coach Babak Mentai enforced his trademark power play in search of the three points just as Boomerangs surged ahead 3-2, the continued Mountain press conceding another as the cause seemed lost for the visitors.
But he who lives by the sword doesn’t always die and two goals in the last minute rescued Majik in a 4-4 result – the third draw for both teams this summer (Inner West Magic have the record for most seasonal deadlocks with four in 2014/15).
While Mentai held reservations about walls surrounding the small Stromlo High court he couldn’t contain his excitement about how his players are responding to his Futsal philosophies.
“This is the best game I’ve seen from my players. There was a lot of possession for us; we pushed them back and kept moving the ball, and I’m very happy for the boys,” he said. “Almost half of our training is to work on fifth-man and this game was in our hands.”
“We were in front in all the draws we’ve had and could been in second position… but the game doesn’t finish until the referee’s whistle for both sides and we’re giving away goals we shouldn’t have.”
“I’m disappointed we didn’t win but cannot say anything because it is not from the defence being bad. I try to talk about the mentality of the game and we have to work hard all the time – one goal difference is not safe, we need to score more which is why I went for the power play,” the Irani-born coach said. “The players are very young and still learning the game.”
“We now have two games before the holiday against half of the national team, playing Dural and Inner West, and I’m looking forward to this. To play against Australia’s best, there is no better opportunity for the players to get more experience and they need to take this chance to show everybody what Futsal they have.”
The 4-4 stalemate ended a sprightly Boomerangs streak of eight home wins in a row – only Dural have won more consecutively at home with 11 straight at The Centre over the 2014/15-2015/16 seasons and 10 across 2012/13-2013/14). The Territorians did extend their home unbeaten run to 10 capital encounters (Warriors went 17 home fixtures undefeated over the 2014/15-2015/16-2016/17 summers following a dozen unbeaten across 2011/12-2012/13 and 10 in a row over 2012/13-2013/14).
Next week’s games
The Football NSW Select Futsal Premier League round seven Saturday action features Mountain Majik against Dural Warriors at Blacktown Leisure Centre (4.40pm), Boomerangs FS host South Coast Taipans at the AIS Training Halls (7.20pm), Inner West Magic play UTS Northside at Valentine Sports Park (7.40pm), and Mascot Vipers meet Enfield Rovers at All Sorts Indoor Sports Centre (8.50pm). Visit the Football NSW website (Futsal tab) for full details.