Central Brown kept the Northland Premier Men's Club Football competition alive by taking a point off competition leaders Kerikeri with a creditable 1-1 away draw.
"Alive" may be taking it a bit far however, according to Nick Smith, the coach of Kamo - who is the only team with amathematical chance of overtaking Kerikeri for the title.
"We see it as more of a slow death," he cracked.
Kamo trail Kerikeri by seven points with just three rounds left to narrow the gap.
"There's really no chance of resuscitation - all Central Brown have done is to put off the inevitable for another week," he said.
Goals to Wayne Crowley and Andrew Dunn gave Kamo a 2-1 win against Tikipunga.
Central Brown's David Sykes latched onto a poor clearance at Kerikeri to put the visitors ahead. They were forced to fight for their point after Kerikeri equalised midway through the second spell and then Central Brown were reduced to 10 men after one of their players was sent off for an ugly tackle.
The real success story of the weekend was Bream Bay's first win of the competition with a 2-1 win over Madhatters.
The young team has finally come of age in the competition. After pushing Central Brown hard last week, they finally managed to hold on to their first points of the season in some style at their home ground at Ruakaka.
