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A young Timaru United side has lived a football fairytale after claiming the top prize at the Canterbury 13th Grade Regional Tournament.
Earlier this month the team, coached by Rick Pooley and Liam Brown, travelled to Christchurch to take part in the three-day tournament at Avonhead Park.
The team was constructed through a trial held at the end of the football season, Pooley said.
“We started training, Liam was the main coach for the skills side of it and I did more of the managing, admin side and a bit of fitness.
“We had 10 weeks of good training.
“The kids improved without a doubt, they were there, they wanted to learn and they wanted to push themselves further.”
After seeing the improvements and attitude towards training, Brown said he was quite excited about the team’s prospects.
This was solidified during a pre-tournament warm-up game against the Timaru Boys’ High School Colts, he said.
“That side is made up of 14- and 15-year-olds and our kids are only 12 pushing on 13.
“Going into that game, we had no expectations of them winning or doing extremely well.
“We just wanted them to get some exposure against players who are older, a bit more experienced and a bit more physical.”
In the first half, the team were only one goal down and they scored just before halftime, he said.
“The boys were just phenomenal, they played well beyond their years and by the end of the game Boys’ High got a few more goals but that sort of really set us in motion for the tournament.
“It got the boys up to par with that physical requirement we were going to face.
“After the 10 weeks we knew we had some good cohesion and these boys had taken on a lot.
“So we were optimistic about the tournament, but definitely didn’t have any expectations.”
Timaru United opened their tournament account in the best possible fashion, picking up a 10-0 win against Parklands United Black.
They followed up the impressive result with an equally impressive 3-2 victory over Coastal Spirit in their next game.
The team then picked up on day two where they left off with a 5-1 win over Waimak United but dropped their first points in a 3-3 draw with Selwyn United.
Despite the draw, the result felt like a win, Brown said.
“In that game, we scored first but a strong wind kicked in and suddenly out of nowhere we conceded two goals against the run of play.
“We went into the second half and conceded another goal.
“We were on the sidelines thinking, ‘oh, this is tough, we don’t know if we can do this’ but the boys didn’t give up.
“With a couple minutes to go we got a corner and scored a nice tap-in and then with about a minute to go we forced another corner and Oliver Campbell curled it straight into the back corner of the net.
Heading into the final day of the tournament, the team needed a draw or a win against FC Twenty 11 to book a spot in the final.
Timaru United were met with a very defensively-minded opposition but managed to claim their place in the final with a hard fought 1-1 draw.
They would come up against Parklands United Gold in the final, which would ultimately come down to the most nerve-wracking of finishes — a penalty shootout.
After another wind-affected game, the scores were locked at 1-1 and with no extra time, the game went straight to penalties.
The boys showed immense bravery heading into the shootout, Brown said.
“Going straight into penalties is tough for any player let alone a junior player.
“I said to the boys ‘regardless of what the result of the shootout is, it doesn’t reflect how well we’ve played this whole tournament. In our eyes we’ve won this thing and whatever happens next is what it is’.
“I asked if anyone wasn’t prepared to take a penalty because I wouldn’t force them to and no one said anything.
“No-one looked at me like they were nervous, they were ready to go and keen as.”
Timaru United went on to win the shootout 6-5 with the winning penalty being scored by the team’s goalkeeper Archie Hunt.
There was a lot of a lot of shouting and emotion when the ball hit the back of the net, Pooley said.
“Both Liam and I were yelling that hard that I couldn’t do any phone consults for work for the next couple of days because I had no voice.
“There would have been a good couple of hundred people on the sidelines, watching the final game and players from about four or five other teams ran on to the field and piled on to the kids.
“I’m glad it finished the way it did because it makes it that much more special.
“It’s almost one of those fairytale endings that you just don’t see.”
Brown said, as coaches, they could not have been more proud of the effort the team put in across the tournament.
“It was never an expectation to win but just to do our best and the boys more than exceeded by never giving up and always believing in each other.
“It’s certainly the highlight of my coaching career so far.
“Our proudest moment of the tournament was receiving word from another club coach who wanted to thank our boys for being involved, saying they showed nothing but respect and encouragement for their peers throughout which had made a profound impact on the other teams who were competing.
“The boys represented their club and region with pride.”