This Friday, March 22nd, a new season of the New Zealand National League will kick off.

Before we begin talking about contenders for the 2024 season, it's important first to highlight the league's structure and how it all works. In the first part of the season, the tournament is divided into three regional phases: the Northern Regional League, the Central Regional League, and the Southern Regional League. The Northern Regional League features 12 teams, while the Central and Southern Regional Leagues each have 10 teams. Each team will face their regional rivals in home and away matches, resulting in three regional champions – one northern, one central and one southern.

Once the regional leagues have concluded, the National League Championship will start. Only 10 teams will have the chance to compete for the national title: four from the northern region (the champions plus the teams in positions 2-4), four from the central region (the champions, Wellington Phoenix reserves, and the other two highest-placed teams), and two from the southern region (the champions and the runner-up).

While it can be speculated that the most populated regions may have stronger teams, last season we had champions from different cities around the country. It’s worth noting that the most important tournaments (OFC Champions League, NZ National League and Chatham Cup) were won by three different teams last year. One team from each region: Auckland City FC (champions of the OFC Champions League), Wellington Olympic (champions of the New Zealand National League), and Christchurch United (champions of the Chatham Cup).

When it comes to contenders for the 2024 National League, we can speculate on the three current champions to win the regional phases:

Auckland City FC is known for reaching the final stages in every tournament the club participate in, and despite significant losses in their squad, they still have players of great quality and experience, such as Cam Howieson (Captain), and the winning mentality of their coach Albert Riera. In addition to their captain, they have young talent in the squad as Liam Gillion, Joe Lee and Nathan Lobo - all of them have played for the U-23 national team - and Stipe Ukich, who despite being only 17 years old, has an interesting potential and could see more playing time this season (he scored the goal for the Navy Blues victory against Wellington Olympic in their first official match this season).

Wellington Olympic, the current champion of the competition, is another contender to retain the title once again. Despite changing their coach - Paul Ifill replaced Rupert Kemeys - “The Greeks” have a very offensive and efficient style. In the National League Championship, they scored 34 goals (10 more than the second-highest scoring team, Cashmere) and this year started with a 3-0 win in their first official match against Christchurch United. Their captain, Ben Mata, is one of the team's standout players and is a tough defender to face for any forward. Other key players include Kailan Goud and Hamish Watson. The two form a great attacking duo. Goud adds speed and great mobility to the team, while Watson, who was one of the top scorers last year, is a very strong player who finishes plays very well. Furthermore, Tor Davenport Peterson and Jack-Henry Sinclair demonstrated excellent performance levels last season and are crucial members of the team, consistently creating scoring opportunities whenever they posses the ball.

Christchurch United will also have a new coach, Ryan Edwards. Of the three contenders, they are the team that lost the most players, and will face the 2024 season with a very young squad, but they also got some experience footballers as Joel Stevens, who won the NZ National League playing for Wellington Olympic last year. The main challenge for Edwards will be to try to establish their style of play during the regional phase to reach the final stage at the best possible level.

Other teams and/or players to watch out for this year:

Eastern Suburbs, who will seek to replicate the good season they had last year, Birkenhead United and Auckland United from the Northern League. Also Miramar Rangers got a renovated squad in the Central League and Cashmere Technical could be a serious contender to win the Southern League.

Players: Emiliano Tade and Garbhan Coughlan. Regarding Tade, he is the all-time top scorer for Auckland City FC and will play for Western Springs this year. As for Coughlan, he had an impressive season in 2023 playing for Cashmere Technical. The Irishman reached the milestone of 42 goals in the year and was among the top 5 goal scorers worldwide, only behind Cristiano Ronaldo, Kylian Mbappe, Harry Kane and Erling Haaland. Other young players to keep an eye on are Campbell Strong, Ryan Verney and Aaryan Raj (Eastern Suburbs); Adam Supyk, Jesse Randall, Eddie Wilkinson and Oliver Colloty (Wellington Olympic), and Oscar Browne (Western Springs).

For this season, we have to consider that there might be some mid-season changes that could impact certain clubs. Auckland FC, the new professional team in the A-League, will need to assemble its squad for its inaugural season and may recruit some players from our NZ National League.

The competition and intensity keeps growing, the majority of the players of the All Whites were formed here, and the National League is getting more competitive every season. Who’s your pick for the New Zealand National League this year?

Article added: Thursday 21 March 2024