Soccer: Clubs eager for White Ribbon Cup start

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The four ASB Premiership clubs involved in this weekend's opening round of the new White Ribbon Cup are eager for the chance to keep or find momentum.

Introduced to give the six clubs not involved in the O-League competitive football where gaps previously existed in the season, the White Ribbon Cup opens on Saturday with Team Wellington hosting Canterbury United and Waikato meeting Hawke's Bay United in Taupo.

For Wellington, who have made the national league playoffs in the past four seasons, the new competition is a crucial step towards bridging the gap to the two Auckland teams.

"I think it's a fantastic initiative from New Zealand Football and they deserve a pat on the back for making it work," said Team Wellington coach Matt Calcott. "It keeps us ticking over and, ultimately, will help us in getting to a level where we can challenge Auckland City and Waitakere.

"It helps address an issue which is seems to be across football in this part of the world. Players want to play but we don't have a reserve team playing regularly to give them all an opportunity.

"We need to strike a balance, however, between giving fringe players an opportunity and developing a winning culture. We want to win football matches regardless of whether it is ASB Premiership or White Ribbon Cup."

Wellington will be still be smarting from a from last week's 1-0 defeat to Canterbury in Christchurch, having played over an hour with just 10 men. Wellington dropped out of the top four for the first time this season while third-placed Canterbury maintained pressure on the leaders after a loss the week before.

For Hawke's Bay United, their White Ribbon opener is initially a chance to rebuild momentum although new coach Chris Greatholder doesn't shy away from the club's ambition to get their hands on the silverware.

"We've found it quite frustrating trying to maintain intensity in the first couple of months with the breaks so the more games we can get the better - I can't wait for it," Greatholder said.

"We were disappointed with how we performed down in Otago so it gives us a chance to bounce back and get some positivity back in the camp.

"We've got four or five injuries to key players at the moment so we haven't got the affordability to change too much but it does give us the chance to try one or two other things but I want to win the game. The board will agree with me that it's a competition we can win."

Declan Edge has taken a long term approach to success, building Waikato FC's core around young players from local clubs. They are still chasing their first points of the current campaign but Edge welcomes the chance for valuable match time.

"It's been well accepted that Waikato FC need to play these White Ribbon Cup games, we're looking forward to playing three or four games on the trot," Edge said. "They are very important to us. The season isn't that long anyway so having three or four more games in there will do us the world of good."

Edge is still without key senior players Matt Williams and David Samson and this week first choice goalkeeper Mark Fulcher is unavailable, giving either Danyon Drake or Max Tommy a chance in goal.

Outside that, Edge hinted there wouldn't be too many personnel changes for the match in Taupo and took a tongue-in-cheek swipe at his critics.

"I'm going to play the players that I think will do a job for Waikato and can pick up the win, like I do every week. Some of the other teams may say they're going to play their kids this weekend but if I said that that I'd be down to nine and ten year olds."