Wednesday, October 10th 1973

Teachers/Pupils Edge United 4-3

Ngaruawahia United played its second-to-last friendly match on Saturday when they met a Teachers/Pupils team on Centennial Park. The ground was hard and the day was fine for United to avenge its defeat at the feet of the Teachers/Pupils team, previously lost by United 3-1.

Bill Burston, Peter Vela, Ian Todd and Sandy MacDonald (all United players) were, on the day, in the Teachers/Pupils team as teachers, the numbers being made up of the pupils of the Ngaruawahia High School. One student, Kerry Barakat, played for United and acquitted himself magnificently.

Neil Gorman opened the scoring for United by intercepting a back-pass to keeper Graham Furness and netted it. Shortly after he took a through ball and outsprinted Sandy MacDonald to hammer in a goal, partially deflected by the keeper.

Peter Vela notched the first goal for the Teachers/Pupils after some hard work in the forwards. He shortly after put one over the bar with only the keeper to beat. At half-time the score stood at 2-1 to United, who were combining well and looking continuously dangerous. George Sunnex and Jim McCaig fed plenty of ball to the forwards who tried to make the most of it.

While United were “refreshing” themselves at half-time, their opposition were eager to be on with the fray. United went further ahead in the second half when a lobbed cross into the penalty area bounced awkwardly for keeper Furness and the loose ball was chested in by Joe Murphy to put United up 3-1.

Again it was Peter Vela who brought his team back into the match when, shortly after skying his second point-blank shot, shot under pressure from two tacklers to put his left-foot attempt off the post into the net. Shortly after a long drive by Peter deflected off a fullback and Teachers/Pupils were even at 3-3. Ian Middleton had played hard throughout the match and was rewarded with the shot of the game. Norman Bateman centred a perfect ball for Ian to collect and move to his left. Keeper Nightingale was covering the developing move but could not get to the match-winning drive from Ian Middleton as he shot off his left foot at an acute angle. The ball entered the net at the far side to give Teachers/Pupils the game 4-3.