Southern Utd's depth its biggest strength - coach

Keeping its champion squad together is a major boost for Southern United's futsal team.

The majority of the same players who won last year's national league will begin their title defence against Canterbury United in Dunedin this weekend.

While that consistency in players is a good thing, Southern coach Darren Hart is unsure whether the tag of champion will be a help
or a hindrance.

"I'm still not convinced whether that tag is going to be a bonus or a detriment to us.

"We've been trying to downplay it a bit.

"I think it can be a dangerous thing when you go in with that notion that you're going to win games just because we're champions and we should win.

"Other teams have struggled with that before, so we're really trying to put that to one side and just do what we do."

The side's two losses come in Ben Wallace, who has finished university and is back in Waikato, and Ito Shunsuke, who has returned to Japan.

However, it has regained the services of Ben O'Farrell, who had been playing football in Europe last summer.

The core of the players from the past few seasons are back and there is plenty of quality there.

Michael Sannum was last year's player of the league, while Queenstown-based Brazilians Carlos Herrmann and Daniel De Souza bring plenty of flair.

Their experience will be key, although Hart believes the side's depth of quality is its biggest strength.

"We don't have the standard cliff other teams have, where they've got a really good five or six and then the next players are 15-year-olds struggling with the level.

"We tend to be able to spread our load across our players more, which really helps with the long tournaments.

"When you play six games in a weekend , if you can't manage the load on your players, you get to those later games and your players can barely walk."

Defending last year's title is the goal, although it is not the focus for Hart.

He said it was important the team continued to take things one step at a time.

That first step was this weekend's two games against Canterbury United.

The sides meet at 4pm tomorrow, before their second game at 10am on Sunday.

After winning the league in 2016, Canterbury finished bottom of the table last year.

Hart said Canterbury looked to have many of the same players, although he was expecting a far tougher challenge.

It had several players in the Futsal Whites wider training squad, which meant it had trained well throughout the winter.

After this weekend, Southern has tournaments in Christchurch and Auckland, before the finals weekend in Wellington on December 7-9.

National Futsal League

Southern Utd v Canterbury Utd

Edgar Centre, tomorrow, 4pm & Sunday, 10am. 
 

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