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Peter Vossen Builders Matamata Swifts have won the Waikato Bay of Plenty Federation league. After 22 games and countless miles on the road, travelling from Otorohanga to Whakatane, Ngaruawahia to Taupo, and myriad places in between, the team from our small town has emerged as champions of the region’s top football league.
Taking the title was far from easy, both over the course of the season and in this must win game. The Swifts found themselves in a hole as early as the sixth minute when the hosts were awarded a  penalty, which was duly converted. Not the start the team needed, but not the first time they would be required to battle back from adversity.
It actually took about 20 minutes for the Matamata machine to crank out of first gear, but when it did any fears the travelling band of Swifts fans, some of who had travelled from as far away as Taupo, may have had were eased aside.
The equaliser came ten minutes before the break. Alberto Romero was bundled over just outside the box, dusted himself off, and then promptly curled home a delicious free kick through the admittedly porous Rovers wall.
From that moment the match and the title were only ever going to end up with one club. The goal that put the Swifts ahead came eight minutes into the second half and was worth waiting the whole season for. Leading scorer, Tim Miller, hit a rasping, rising drive from fully 30 metres that was past the Rovers keeper before he knew what was going on. A goal of the season contender in the game of the season for Matamata.
Matamata was forced to play the final twenty minutes with ten players after Mike Spencer was sent-off for placing his neck between the hands of a Claudelands player. It was an impetuous dismissal on the part of the referee, but thankfully the balance of the game wasn’t destroyed because Spencer’s assailant was also marched.
Miller turned home his second goal, the crucial third for Matamata, with nine minutes remaining. It was a close range strike following good work down the right by Mark Abbs. With only a couple of minutes left Miller was then shown a red card of his own for nothing more than a little argy bargy. Once again, it was a poor call on behalf of the ref who had an otherwise solid game.
But it made little difference to the outcome of the match and, therefore, the season. The victory means Matamata finished two points ahead of Taupo and that finally the lakesiders’ stranglehold on the Waikato Bay of Plenty title is broken. And winning it on the last day of the season is, when all's said and done, really quite a fun way to do it!
The Waikato Times report of the same game is here
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