Soccer: Force in fight for survival

Relegation again threatens North Force footballers after poor defending saw them defeated 2-3 by Papatoetoe at Tikipunga.

North Force dropped to second bottom in the Northern League first division table after Metro and Ngaruawahia both had wins to move above them.

Whangarei's top side never recovered from a poor start after being stunned by two goals just eight minutes into the match.

An early speculator caught a nasty deflection, wrong footing keeper Leon Taylor and a couple of minutes later sloppy defending cost them a penalty.

To their credit, North Force forced their way back into the game with Scott Burgess scoring a good goal.

But chances of a comeback were dashed when they conceded again before halftime. Down 3-1, they were the better team in the second spell but only had Mark Ruddle's 70th minute strike to show for it.

It is the tenth time this season that the team has lost by a single goal and the result had coach and former North Force central defender Bruce Plunkett contemplating coming out of retirement.

"I hope we're not that desperate yet but I thought we had turned a corner this season but in the last two games we're back making the same kind of mistakes we were at the start of the season."

He said the defence was still giving up simple chances but the attack was far from blameless, with poor finishing costing them several chances to rescue the game.

"We're scoring the hard ones and missing the easy ones and that's costing us points at the moment."

North Force's reserves also went down 2-3 to Papatoetoe in the early match while the club's three junior teams also played at Tikipunga on Saturday. The U-14 girls had a 7-0 win over Western Springs with Ellie Hacker and Natalie Dey scoring doubles.

The U-13 boys went down 2-3 to East Coast Bays while the U-15 boys trailed 1-2 at halftime before being outplayed in the second spell and ending up 1-6 down.

Kamo continue to make the running in the Northland Premier League with a comfortable 4-1 win over FC Whangarei. Kerikeri moved into second place with a 3-0 win over Tikipunga. Central Brown are third after their 5-0 thumping of Madhatters.