The 1984 New Zealand National Soccer League was the 15th season of a nationwide round-robin club competition in

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

football.

Gisborne City Gisborne City AFC was an association football club in Gisborne, New Zealand. Founded in 1939 as Eastern Union, the club changed its name to Gisborne City after winning the Central Districts League at the first attempt in 1967. As Eastern Union, ...

finally wrestled the trophy away from the major centres, taking it to a provincial city for the first time.Hilton (1991), p. 180

Promotion and relegation

Dunedin Technical Dunedin Technical (known locally as Tech) is a semi-professional association football club in Dunedin, New Zealand. They compete in the ODT FootballSouth Premier League and were the 2018 ODT FootballSouth Premier League champions. Club history ...

did not apply for re-entry to the league, so the resumption of play-offs for league places was simply between the winners of the northern, central, and southern leagues (

Auckland University The University of Auckland is a public university, public research university based in Auckland, New Zealand. It is the largest, most comprehensive and highest-ranked university in New Zealand and consistently places among the top 100 universit ...

Stop Out Stop Out Sports Club, commonly known as Stop Out, is an association football club in Lower Hutt, New Zealand is based at Hutt Park, Moera in Lower Hutt. History The Stop Out organisation started in 1919 with the aim of providing recreation to T ...

, and Rangers respectively). Auckland University were victorious, entering the national league for the first time.

Team performance

produced a marked improvement on their previous efforts, becoming the first team from outside Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch to take the title. The win was a very popular one, and was in large part due to the work of

Kevin Fallon Kevin Barry Fallon (born 3 December 1948) is an English-born football coach residing in New Zealand. He is the father of New Zealand international footballer Rory Fallon and former coach of the Cook Islands national football team but did not man ...

. The side were only defeated once all season, by

Manurewa Manurewa is a major suburb in South Auckland, New Zealand. It was part of Manukau City before the creation of the Auckland super city in 2010. It is located south of the Manukau, Manukau City Centre, and southeast of Auckland CBD. The subur ...

, and followed that loss up with a string of six victories which produced an aggregate goal tally of 18-0. The side amassed a total of 59 goals, second only to

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

's runaway

1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the ''International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the ''Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the song ...

performance.

Papatoetoe Papatoetoe is a suburb in Auckland, New Zealand. It is the largest suburb in Auckland by population and is located to the northwest of Manukau Central, and 18 kilometres southeast of Auckland CBD. Papatoetoe has the unofficial title of Auckland ...

were also a popular side, and their second season in the league saw them in title contention until a form slump in the latter part of the season. They still held on to finish second, ahead of

Christchurch United Christchurch United is an amateur association football club in Christchurch, New Zealand. They compete in various Mainland Football competitions at Junior and Senior level. The club has won six National League titles and six Chatham Cup trophi ...

, whose title run was also badly hampered by poor late-season form. Manurewa showed little of the form that they had displayed in their championship-winning 1983 campaign. The team was in the league's basement for the early p[art of the season, and never fully recovered, though they did pull themselves up into the top third of the table by season's end.Hilton (1991), p. 106 Capital city rivals Miramar Rangers and Wellington Diamond United filled out the remainder of the top half of the table. Both could be satisfied with their position, though WDU had a chance to finish higher but failed to win any of its last five games. The team's home form was poor, with only two wins all season. Dunedin City finished seventh, pulling themselves together after a lacklustre early part to the season. A 0-6 loss to Gisborne City seems to have scared the side into performing well, turning their form around significantly from this mid-season point to win seven of their final ten fixtures.

Napier City Rovers Napier City Rovers is a football team based in Napier, New Zealand, competing in the Central Premier League. Club history The team was founded in 1973 via a merger of Napier Rovers and Napier City. Napier City Rovers have won New Zealand's p ...

finished eighth for the third consecutive season, though their form was probably less consistent than in previous years. Their matches tended to be high scoring, with an aggregate of 91 goals for and against in their 22 fixtures.Hilton (1991), pp. 106-108 Hanimex

North Shore United North Shore United Association Football Club is an amateur football club based in the North Shore, Auckland. They compete in the Northern League, where they last won the competition in 2019. Their home ground is Allen Hill Stadium, which is lo ...

could not find the form which had seen them runners-up two seasons in a row, and fell to ninth. Their powerful home form deserted them, and they suffered five defeats at home — taking their aggregate over three seasons to six. The season's big surprise, however, was Mount Wellington who fell from their perennial perch near the top of the table to finish tenth with only one victory in its last 12 games. It could have been worse for the Mount, as they had, in the early part of the season, scraped to a 4-3 win over

when reduced to ten men, after trailing three times during the match. If that result had gone the other way, it would likely have seen the Mount finish the season at the foot of the table.

Nelson United Nelson United was a New Zealand soccer club, based in the South Island city of Nelson. Their home ground was Guppy Park. The team was founded in 1968 through the amalgamation of Nelson Thistle (founded 1924) and Nelson Rangers (founded 1950 ...

looked to be finishing last for much of the season, but a late rally was just enough to lift them off the basement.

proved to be the unlucky side to finish last — unlucky, in that it had played effectively during its first season in the league, winning heavily when it did win, and only losing by single goal margins. This led to it having an unlikely goal difference of just -5 at the season's end.Hilton (1991), pp. 108 Despite finishing last, University won the 1985 play-off series and returned to the league.

League table

Records and statistics

;Golden Boot Award (Top scorer) * Colin Walker (Gisborne City)

References

Sources

*Hilton, T. (1991) ''An association with soccer.'' Auckland: The New Zealand Football Association. . {{NZNSL New Zealand National Soccer League seasons 1