Through word of mouth, the early Tuesday night sessions, which attracted seven to 12 of the more intrepid parents or social players, grew.
Now, lead organiser Mark Papworth has to map out several pitches just to accommodate the huge number of attendees from various abilities, ages, nations and backgrounds hooning around the park every Tuesday evening.
“We initially set it up to try to give the local community some easy access to adult football and some of the non-playing coaches of the kids teams a bit of foot-on-ball time too,” Papworth said.
“Over time, numbers grew, and people enjoyed themselves and came back. Over the last few weeks, we’ve been catering for 60-plus players of mixed ages and abilities.”
With numbers that big, the club began to wonder if a Saturday team might be realistic.
After a tentative look into the prospect ahead of the 2022 season, Waipuna finally had a Saturday senior men’s team when they entered the Rangers into the WaiBOP Bay 3 Over-35 competition for the 2023 campaign, with Papworth as head coach.
It’s a ragtag bunch of guys from around the globe and different age brackets all united in one cause — enjoyment through the beautiful game.
“The Waipuna Rangers has been born out of this mishmash of assorted players,” said Papworth, who himself is an emergency playing option in times of great need.
“Some of the players had retired from competitive football years back, others had never played 11-a-side football until the beginning of this season.
“On the whole, we’re just a group of fellas trying to help each other out on a football pitch.”
As for entering the Chatham Cup, Waipuna are under no illusions of a potential dream run. The chance to have their name in the hat and enjoy a day out in South Auckland is enough.
“I wouldn’t say we’re ranked at the bottom of the Chatham Cup rankings, but we’re probably in the bottom one.
“But we’ll enjoy our day, and we’re pretty excited to take part in New Zealand’s most prestigious football competition.”
Waipuna’s opponents Pukekohe AFC compete in the NRF Community Senior Men’s Division Four. They are yet to kick off their league campaign and have also had several pre-season friendlies cancelled at the last minute.
The travelling side can therefore take heart from the fact they are already two games into their WaiBOP season.
A draw in their first game was followed by a first competitive win, 4-1, over Otūmoetai Gunners, with Beto Reis, Chris Pronk and Rod Pinochet getting on the scoresheet.
The South Auckland outfit does, however, have previous tournament experience, returning to Chatham Cup competition for the first time since 2014 on Saturday.
On that occasion, after a preliminary-round win over West Hamilton, their cup run ended against Bay of Plenty opposition in a 4-3 first-round loss to Ngongotaha AFC.
The main prerogative, as it always has been with the after-work run-outs since 2019, will be for Waipuna’s players to enjoy themselves. But pulling off a similar feat for the region and putting themselves in the draw for the first round proper wouldn’t hurt.
Waipuna Rangers face Pukekohe AFC at Bledisloe Park in Pukekohe on Saturday, April 22, with kick-off at 2pm.
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