Welcome to the Friday Forecast ahead of Round 9 of the McDonald's NPL Tasmania. The corresponding Round 2 fixtures provided us with an entertaining weekend of football and this looms as another interesting week as we head towards the halfway mark of the season.
Zebras Look To Shrug Off Missed Opportunities Against South
The Clarence Zebras will be hoping to put the heartbreak of the past fortnight behind them as they welcome South Hobart to Wentworth Park. Having come within minutes of doing what no side has done in 16 months and knock off Devonport, twice now in the space of the last two weeks, only to fall short both times, the Zebras must dust themselves off and prepare for another big challenge here.
If they can produce the type of efforts that have got them into these strong positions against Devonport in the past fortnight, then they will be every chance, provided they can see out the full 90 and play to the final whistle. If you switch off a second at this level, you will be punished, which is something they were rather brutally reminded of last week.
South Hobart meanwhile continues to be somewhat inconsistent. Their best football is as good as anybody’s, but maintaining that level continues to be a problem. Their match against the Lions last week was a bit of an encapsulation of their season. For 45 minutes they looked incredible, torching the Lions and pulling the defence apart to race out to a 3-0 lead. Then in the second half, they conceded two, stopped looking overly threatening and were hanging out for the final whistle to just hold onto victory. They’re trending in the right direction though and could put a buffer between themselves and the Zebras of 6 points with a win at home. Other results will determine if these two sides occupy 4th and 5th still after this weekend, but in the race for the top 4 and finals, this looms as an important match.
The prior meeting between the two sides was a thrilling match where both sides had opportunities to win late on but were forced to settle for a point in a 2-2 draw. Hopefully, we get a similarly compelling contest here and with the level both these sides have played at recently, there’s no reason to expect anything else.
Lions Eye Chance To Snap Form Skid
In the second mid afternoon kick-off, the Kingborough Lions will take on Riverside Olympic at Darcy Street. No that isn’t a typo, with Lightwood Park out of action, the Lions have yet another venue that will normally be a home ground for them. This time it’s a travelling side they host, and given travel is by far the biggest factor in home/road advantages, this does at least feel like an actual advantage this week.
This is a game where both sides will be desperate to get three points, though for different reasons. The Lions are now five points out of the top 4 and have just a single victory in their past five NPL outings. After a promising start to the season, things have taken a Southward turn and so this game against a struggling Riverside outfit provides them the perfect chance to get back on track.
Riverside have been unable to build on their breakthrough win over Launceston United and they’ve now been blanked in their last three starts. They aren’t going to be able to improve their record unless they can find some goals from somewhere, and fortunately for them, this is a Lions defence that has looked rather vulnerable this season and given up some soft goals, so they are undoubtedly gettable.
Keeping them out at the other end will be the bigger challenge, as, despite the Lion's indifferent campaign so far, they have still scored 23 goals, which is the second most in the league. With Noah Mies leading the line, Kobe Kemp tucked in behind and threats from wide areas from Othman, Taylor and Kantzos, this is a team with enough firepower to overwhelm Riverside. They should be too strong here, but they will need to be better than they were in the first 45 minutes last week to ensure it.
City Seeking More KGV Success
The Glenorchy Knights and Launceston City will be looking to string together consecutive victories when they meet at KGV on Saturday evening.
The sides have met once this season, which was also at KGV. It was a dramatic game that saw Launceton City sneaking a 92nd-minute match winner via Jack Woodland as they demonstrated to the league they were going to be a tough side to beat this season. They also claimed a 1-0 win the year prior at KGV, so this a venue that should hold no fears for a City side who have well truly proved they can come down the road and handle this Knights team. A win would see them leaping Knights up into second place on the table, so the stakes are high for both sides.
Both those 1-0 results ranked as upsets and the Knights side will be eager to prevent a third such defeat if they are to remain in contact with the Devonport Strikers at the top of the table. They have little margin for error in chasing down this juggernaut, so they simply cannot afford to be dropping home games if they want to remain in the title race. A loss here would be catastrophic to any title hopes they have.
The numbers suggest we should perhaps be expecting another low scoring clash this time around. The Knights boast the league’s most stingy defence, conceding just three times this season, whilst City rank third with 9 goals against. The side's average goals scored by either side in games they’ve played in this season of 2.25 and 3.12 are also the two lowest in the competition.
Strikers Should Cruise At Home
In the weekend’s final game, the Devonport Strikers will take on Launceston United at Valley Road. This is a battle of top v bottom, an undefeated side up against one yet to claim their first points. Neither’s position is overly surprising, given Devonport are such a powerhouse and United are in their first top-flight season and still figuring things out. Still, it does lead to the Strikers entering this match as probably the heaviest favourite in any potential match-up we will see all season.
The last time Devonport lost a game was Round 2 of last season. They are now unbeaten in their past 26 NPL games and that number rises to 37 if you include the Lakoseljac and Summer Cup competitions. As they demonstrated last week, this is a side that simply doesn’t understand the meaning of the word defeat and even when they look done, they still somehow find a way. Their performances in the last month or so haven’t been their best, but they’ve kept on winning and that’s got to be a frightening prospect for the rest of the league, this is a team that has improvement left in them.
United are unlikely to get their breakthrough result here but should be aiming to improve upon the 6-1 defeat they suffered on their last trip to Valley Road. The first half of that game they kept it to 0-0 and looked solid before being overrun as the game wore on. If they can avoid the late fadeout, an improved result should be achievable.
Round 9
Saturday 2 June
Kingborough Lions v Riverside Olympic, 2:00pm, Darcy Street
Clarence Zebras v South Hobart, 2:30pm, Wentworth Park
Glenorchy Knights v Launceston City, 4:30pm, KGV
Devonport Strikers v Launceston United, 4:30pm, Valley Road