North Canberra Fire romped to the top of the Capital Futsal League with a stunning return to form following a sticky 2023 campaign, as they got the new year off to a devastating start with a 12-3 victory over Queanbeyan-Palerang Power.
Marko Rathouski led the way with a hat-trick for the Fire, who welcomed back Season 1 Golden Boot winner Maxx Green to their ranks, the goal-machine bagging twice within the space of two second-half minutes upon his introduction.
Samuel Thomson and Riley Brown also both scored twice, as the Fire were in complete control against a new-look Power, who handed CFL debuts to a raft of players amongst their lengthy squad list. Three of those, Andre Oliveira, Keiren Allen, and Pedro Pereira netted their maiden goals at this level in reply.
UC Stars recovered from an opening Round defeat to see off ANU Apex 9-2 in the University derby, Anthony Giorgi netting a second successive hat-trick to take his personal haul to six in two matches and an early lead in the Golden Boot race.
New signing Phakedi Manda added to the scorers list with a brace of his own, as did last year’s joint leading scorer Nick Pratezina. There was also a first CFL goal for Cale Brown, as well as a rare one from Jake Wilsener.
The Apex responded through Zac Peelgrane and Braulio Melo but were second best in most areas and were unable to get to within touching distance of their opponents in an effort to get back into the match.
A stunning fixture between South Canberra Swift and West Canberra Lightning was settled in favour of the Lightning 9-8 as a goal from Nathen Megic eight minutes from time settled a seventeen-goal thriller.
Lightning roared into a four-goal lead inside nine minutes as a striker from Michael Southam was added to by a brace from Nichoals Subasic and a gal from Nik Popovich, only for three goals in two minutes from Patrick Shore and Alessandro Pena (two) to bring Swift back into it by half-time.
Subasic extended Lightning’s lead, only for goals from Romeo and Doug Woodiwiss to level the match. Josh Gaspari restored Lightning’s advantage, Fernando responding in kind for Swift, before Megic and Popovich appeared to have swung momentum Lightning’s way.
Unbelievably, Shore and Romeo scored within seconds of each other to bring parity, but Megic stuck within moments of the kick-off to ultimately win it for the Lightning.
RESULTS
ROUND 2
North Canberra Fire 12 (Allen 6’ (og), Rathouski 16’, 17’, 40’, Thomson 20’, 33’, Brown 25’, 40’, Ciminelli 27’, Green 27’, 29’, Hawker 36’) QP Power 3 (Oliveira 20’, Allen 29’, Pereira 30’)
South Canberra Swift 8 (Shore 17’, 31’, Pena 19’, 19’, Romeo 26’, 32’, Woodiwiss 28’, Fernando 29’) West Canberra Lightning 9 (M. Southam 2’, Subasic 6’, 9’, 26’, Popovich 8’, 30’, Gaspari 29’, Megic 29’, 32’)
UC Stars 9 (Giorgi 2’, 12’, 31’, Pratezina 9’, 26’, Brown 17’, Manda 23’, 33’, Wilsener 39’) ANU Apex 2 (Peelgrane 16’, Braulio Melo 31’
TABLE
P | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | PTS | ||
1 | North Canberra Fire | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 12 | 3 | +9 | 3 |
2 | UC Stars | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 14 | 10 | +4 | 3 |
3 | South Canberra Swift | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 16 | 14 | +2 | 3 |
4 | West Canberra Lightning | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 9 | 8 | +1 | 3 |
5 | ANU Apex | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 9 | -7 | 0 |
6 | QP Power | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 12 | -9 | 0 |
TOP SCORERS
6: Anthony GIORGI (Stars)
4: ROMEO (Swift)
3: Marko RATHOUSKI (Fire), Patrick SHORE (Swift), Nicholas SUBASIC (Lightning)
2: Riley BROWN (Fire), Marco GAYER (Swift), Maxx GREEN (Fire), Jayde JAMES-WARD (Stars), Phakedi MANDA (Stars), Nathen MEGIC (Lightning), Alessandro PENA (Swift), Nik POPOVICH (Lightning), Nicholas PRATEZINA (Stars), Samuel THOMSON (Fire)
1: Keiren ALLEN (Power), Cale BROWN (Stars), Jonathan CIMINELLI (Fire), Marcus CRISPE (Swift), FERNANDO (Swift), Josh GASPARI (Lightning), Brandon HAWKER (Fire), Braulio MELO (Apex), Andre OLIVIERA (Power), Zac PEELGRANE (Apex), Pedro PEREIRA (Power), Michael SOUTHAM (Lightning), Tony SPASESKI (Swift), Ryan STRAUB (Swift), Jake WILSENER (Stars), Doug WOODIWISS (Swift), Own GOALS