Marked for Dane Nelson
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad11 Sep 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Waitakere United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Sep 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Dane Nelson and Waitakere United agree another 3 years.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Marco Barbarouses has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Waitakere United will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market26 Jun 2028
The bid was some way short and Waitakere United did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Zach Lisolajski was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad26 Jun 2028
52 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Waitakere United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Squad24 Apr 2028
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad3 Apr 2028
Zach Lisolajski was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad3 Apr 2028
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Dane Nelson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad27 Mar 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Waitakere United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Mar 2028
The manager makes an example of Stefan Garbett
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad27 Mar 2028
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match13 Mar 2028
14 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Squad13 Mar 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Waitakere United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Clayton Garbett has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Waitakere United will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad8 Nov 2027
Marco Colvey breaks a bone — 111 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 111 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market8 Nov 2027
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Waitakere United, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match8 Nov 2027
3 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Match6 Nov 2027
No end in sight to Waitakere United's wait for a win
6 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Waitakere United has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Zach Lisolajski was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad8 Nov 2027
14 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Market8 Nov 2027
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Dane Lockyer has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Waitakere United.
Squad8 Nov 2027
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Player ratings8 Nov 2027
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.52 on the card, and the Waitakere United support went home talking about one name.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad18 Oct 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Waitakere United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom18 Oct 2027
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Waitakere United
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Match16 Oct 2027
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Waitakere United did not have in the autumn.
Market18 Oct 2027
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Joe Cacace has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market18 Oct 2027
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Jake Bell has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market18 Oct 2027
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Stefan Kirwan is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market18 Oct 2027
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Kosta Van Hattum is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Squad18 Oct 2027
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Loan watch18 Oct 2027
Sam Reid wants to come home
“I did not go to Auckland City to sit and watch. I want to come back to Waitakere United and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 13 matches say the rest.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad27 Sep 2027
Zach Lisolajski was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad27 Sep 2027
At 33 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Chris Van Hattum has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Waitakere United will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
In brief
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Squad
Dane Nelson falls out with a teammate over standards
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match26 Apr 2027
Position 3 and 17 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Zach Lisolajski was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Loan watch26 Apr 2027
“I watch every Waitakere United game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Southern United runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.