By Martin Stern
Football South Burnett
Gunners hosted Barambah on a beautiful day for football in Kingaroy.
The Second Division game was a hard-fought tussle with not much between the two sides.
Before the match two Irish backpackers were spotted having a kick around.
The Barambah coach and fellow Irishman Alan Eagleson had a chat with them and both were signed up on the spot, registered online and were free to play Second Division.
Shane Loftus and Matt Langford are on a working holiday and currently labouring on a duboisia farm.
They are due to leave in a few weeks but there is a chance more local work may be found for them.
Shane repaid Barambah by scoring the winner in Second Division.
In the women’s game, both sides were understrength and this hit Gunnettes harder than their counterparts.
Elle Mollenhauer returned from a vacation in Thailand and started where she left off by scoring her second hat-trick of the season. Elle has now scored seven goals this season.
Megan Sippel scored a pair to make it 5-0 to Barambah.
In First Division, a somewhat understrength Barambah side – with many players doubling up from seconds – went down 3-0 to Gunners.
Despite the loss, Barambah never gave in and there are some positive signs for them.
Gunners took the lead in the fifth minute when Zac Strauss ran on to a through ball and buried it in the back of the net. The remainder of the first half saw very few real chances and Gunners went into halftime with the lead.
Two minutes into the second half, Gunners went 2-0 up with an amazing effort from Anwat (Ike) Sililat. Ike weaved his way through a group of defenders to score one of the best individual goals seen this season.
To their credit, Barambah did not let their heads drop but could not capitalise in front of goal.
In the 82nd minute Hayden Mashford scored a long-range screamer, his first goal in seniors, to wrap up the game 3-0 for Gunners.
Best for Gunners were Hayden Mashford and Mitch Potter while Luke Miller was again the standout player for Barambah.
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Nanango stamped their dominance in 1st Division with a resounding 4-0 win over premiers Wests in Nanango on Saturday.
Again it was Kerian and Justin Mangan, scoring two goals each.
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A Level 4 (entry level) Referees Course will be held on May 27 at Nanango Soccer Grounds.
Start is 8:30am and the course is free.
For more information, contact Martin on 0437-636-483 or by email by Wednesday this week at the latest.
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RESULTS
1st Division
Nanango 4 (K. Mangan 2, J. Mangan 2), Wests 0
Gunners 3 (Z. Strauss, A. Silialat, H. Mashford), Barambah 0
2nd Division
Nanango 4 (N. Kraukzts 2, T. Adams, M. Strack), Wests 2 (S. Gray 2)
Barambah 1 (S. Loftus), Gunners 0
Women
Wests 1 (B. Neil), Nanango 0
Barambah 5 (E. Mollenhauer 3, M. Sippel 2), Gunnettes 0
- Next week’s matches are Nanango v Barambah in Nanango and Wests v Gunners in Kingaroy.
