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Peter Vossen Builders Matamata Swifts have returned to winning ways with a stirring 3-2 home victory over one of the form teams in the league, Mt Albert-Ponsonby AFC. Matamata was well worth their victory, performing well and creating plenty of chances while allowing their visitors only a handful of opportunities. For all that it was left to Mike Beard to score the winner against a 10 man Mt Albert-Ponsonby side in the 1st minute of added time.
Matamata, with a rejigged back four, started this game strongly and didn’t look like conceding their now familiar early goal. Ged Parkinson was back in the starting line-up while Grant Cooper moved in  from left back to join him in the middle. The Swifts lost Pete Shannan in the 9th minute with a calf injury.
The team’s early pressure was rewarded when Tim Miller got on the end of a Michael Beard cross to side foot home a well worked opening goal. Beard himself went close to scoring not long after, but put a header over the bar from a superb Alberto Romero cross. Stu Watene also went close, drilling a snap-shot just wide, while Beard lifted another shot just over the advancing keeper.
The visitors equalised on 25 minutes with a superb swerving shot from distance. It was a great strike but left a sour taste in the mouth of the Swifts bench as there was a clear handball in the build-up to the goal. This bad taste was soon washed away when Beard restored Matamata ’s lead on the half hour. He was in the right place to pick up the scraps and pass the ball into an empty net after the visitors’ goalie and one of his defenders collided on the edge of the box.
The second half certainly wasn ’t short on incident, as the referee’s cards started coming out in an attempt to control a game that had lifted a notch or two. While it was competitive, the visitors didn’t look like scoring until they were gifted a penalty in the 86th minute. It was a harsh call on Swifts keeper, Tom Pamment, and the visitors, by then reduced to ten men, made no mistake in levelling things up and seemingly securing an unlikely point from the match.
But there was more to come. The Swifts drove forward, forcing the visitors' keeper to make a superb, point blank reflex save, then won a corner as the clock ticked past 90 minutes. With everyone forward, the corner was delicious, falling to Andy Birchenough who volleyed through a crowded penalty area. His shot was saved but the rebound fell to the left foot of Michael Beard and there was only ever one place the ball was going to end up after that.
The two sides meet again in the cup this Saturday in a match that promises more fireworks. Kick-off is at 2pm at Anderson Park in Auckland.
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