Berkeley Sports FC vs Corrimal Rangers

Berkeley Sports and Social Club

Kick-off: Saturday, 3pm.

Referee: Blake Herbert

This week’s District League Feature Match sees the 2^nd placed Corrimal Rangers take on 8^th placed Berkeley at Berkeley Sports and Social Club.

Rangers will be looking to shorten the gap between themselves and first placed Shell Cove which currently sits at six points.

Berkeley presently occupy 8^th spot, but interestingly they hold two games in hand which could theoretically, should they win those games, see them move up as high as 3^rd place on the table.

Corrimal enter the match after a last minute 3-2 win over Wests Illawarra last week while Berkeley were held to a 2-2 draw with Picton Rangers.

The two sides will be meeting for the second time this season after Corrimal came away with a 2-1 win in Round 1 thanks to a brace from Luke Picciolini.

Rangers coach Dave Cuda expects to field a very different 11 to the Round 1 clash because of injuries and World Cup fever.

“We’ve lost a number of players who have gone overseas for the World Cup and we also have a number of players out injured as well,” said Cuda.

“From the team that played Berkeley at the start of the year we’re probably going to have about seven players out.

The northern suburbs club will be forced to utilise a number of its younger players but Cuda believes there are positives to giving the youth players a run.

“We’ll be relying on a couple of the young guys to step up but we’ll manage it well and hopefully come away with a result,” he said.

“It gives the young guys a good opportunity to show what they can do and I think they’re going to do well for us.”

Berkeley have taken points in their last four games and Cuda is expecting a tough showdown with the southern suburbs club.

“Berkeley are always very competitive and they’ve got a lot of experienced guys in the team who like to play at a quick tempo so it’ll be an extremely tough game for us,” he said.

Key Players: Luke Picciolini returned to the starting line-up last week to score the first goal in Corrimal’s 3-2 win and Rangers will be hoping he can continue is fine scoring form this season.

Meanwhile, Chris Rowlan has scored a goal in each of his last three appearances for Berkeley and he’ll be a player that Corrimal must look to shut down.

 

Julian Keith

FSC Reporter