Tech old boys trounced after midweek triumph

Two games in four days were too much for Tech College Old Boys, who could not follow up their Wednesday night success and were hammered in Saturday's Manawatu Division 1 fixture.

Coach Russell Burgess had reason to be optimistic after TCOB picked up their first win in the deferred game against Levin's MCOB 4-3.

For the game, only two players were missing because of injury.

"Pretty much a full squad, first time this season to have numbers, and the boys performed well.

"Constructive, dominant game and reaped the rewards, but still had a certain amount of potential to do a lot better than they did."

TCOB were up 3-1 in the second half before MCOB came back at them, thanks to some good young talent from the Central Under-18s.

Forwards Bryce McKenzie and Ryan Gray both scored twice as TCOB picked up their first win of the season.

MCOB had performed well against College before the midweek game, but when TCOB faced them on Saturday, everything went to sea in a 0-8 loss.

"We had a very good [opening] ten minutes and then the structure broke down a bit," said Burgess.

"They were outgunned. The spark just wasn't in the step."

After letting in a couple of easy goals, TCOB just did not lift like they had on Wednesday.

"I was expecting them to be competitive in that game, they had equal opportunity, but didn't prove that on Saturday," said Burgess.

The team will now have a home match with Palmerston North Boys' High at Gonville at 3pm this weekend.

In the women's Division 2, the good run of form of the Whanganui combined team also came to a screeching halt with their first loss - against the table-topping College Development - a 7-0 blitz in Palmerston North.

Coach Colleen Baylis said she had been racking her brains as to what they could have done differently.

"The communication wasn't there.

"Their players are the kind you can't let have the ball in any kind of space whatsoever."

The College team have had several decent players come down from their Division 1 squad, along with a couple of national masters representatives.

Baylis said it would have been much worse without the efforts of keeper Joanna Bell, a Central U18 squad member.

Whanganui slipped from third to fourth on the ladder behind Development, HSHC B and HSHC Evergreens.

However, their opponents on Saturday, at 6pm, are Massey, who have one win and a draw from their five games.

"[Development] was always going to be our hardest game," said Baylis. "The key is just to keep winning [other games], stay in the top four."