NUAFC 1968-2018

1995
Ngaruawahia bags Altex Cup for first time
- Tokoroa Tournament -
Ngaruawahia swelled the ranks of Waikato
soccer clubs with something to celebrate this season
when it won the Altex cup at Tokoroa on the weekend.
It was the first time the greens - perennial
entrants - have collected the cup and $1500 first prize,
and club celebrations continued until 3am Monday.
“It was great stuff,” said Ngaruawahia coach
Jeff Coulshed. “We were clapped off the field at the end
of the final. I think we could have beaten Waikato
United the way we played.”
Ngaruawahia beat Dogbolters - a mix of
Auckland Premier clubs Pakuranga Town and Howick - 3
-1 in the final after coming from behind to force extra
time.
Craig Murphy scored from the edge of the box
10 minutes from time to level, with Coulshed
acknowledging it as “the winning goal”.
In extra time Craig Jessep put Ngaruawahia
ahead and Andrew Pearson scored with a header. Matt
Williams was named player of the final.
In the semi-finals Ngaruawahia beat
Claudelands Rovers 3-0 and Dogbolters beat Cambridge 4-
2.
Earlier Tokoroa caused the upset of the
tournament in beating Premier League champion Melville
4-2 in group play in the nine-team tournament.
New player finds himself tongue-tied off the field
Soccer is a way of life for Liverpudlian Craig Murphy,
but deciphering Maori place names is something else.
The 25-year-old Ngaruawahia United import is relaxed
enough with a ball at his feet but finds spelling and even
pronouncing the name of his new club something of a trial.
“All I could tell them back home was I was playing for
‘Something United’,” Murphy admits. “And I had to look up the
telephone directory three times just to get the spelling right for a
postcard.”
A left-sided midfielder, Murphy arrived from nonleague
Stantondale in Liverpool last week to give a much-needed
boost to Ngaruawahia’s ranks for the next six months in the
Bluebird Premier League.
Ngaruawahia Coach Jeff Coulshed signed him during an
off-season visit to England.
To say Murphy is keen on soccer is an understatement.
He remains a season-ticket holder at Anfield (Liverpool
FC) at a cost of $NZ750, even though his own playing - and now
travelling - commitments means he can never hope to see
Saturday matches there.
This will be Murphy’s first experience of soccer outside
England.
In what little play he has seen in New Zealand so far,
Murphy has been pleasantly surprised at the space and time
allowed on the ball, and marvelled at how “unphysical” matches
have been.
But he is under no illusions as to the difficulty of his task
at Ngaruawahia, which has retained only three first-team players
from last season.
As long as we stay up we’ll have done well.
“But we could finish as the surprise team of the season.”
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