The 1987 Chatham Cup was the 60th annual nationwide knockout

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

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 ...

. Up to the last 16 of the competition, the cup was run in three regions (northern, central, and southern).

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team s ...

teams received a bye until the final 32 stage. In all, 143 teams took part in the competition. Note: Different sources give different numberings for the rounds of the competition: some start round one with the beginning of the regional qualifications; others start numbering from the first national knock-out stage. The former numbering scheme is used in this article.

The 1987 final

As with the 1986 competition, the final was held over two legs, one at the home ground of each finalist. In all, ten goals were scored in the two matches, a record for a finals competition (though not normally considered as a record for a final, due to the two-legged nature of the tie). The two teams involved,

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, ...

and Christchurch United, also finished first and second in the year's national league, though in that competition Christchurch had the upper hand. The first leg, held in Gisborne, was an exciting if one-sided affair, with a high standard of play.

's first goal came in just the third minute, through Fijian player Stan Morrell.

Paul Nixon Paul Andrew Nixon (born 21 October 1970) is an English cricket coach and former professional cricketer who played for Leicestershire, England, England A, Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and Kent. He is a wicket-keeper and left-handed batsman. N ...

was the second to get his name in the scorebook, and at the break it was 2-0. Morell got a second ten minutes after the interval, but the last 20 minutes of the match saw a flurry of goals, with

Johan Verweij Johan Verweij is a former football (soccer) player who represented New Zealand at international level. Playing career Verweij made his full All Whites debut in a 1–0 win over Australia on 13 June 1979 and ended his international playing care ...

reducing the deficit before two late strikes from Kevin Birch and

Steve Sumner Steven Paul Sumner (2 April 1955 – 8 February 2017) was an English-born, New Zealand football player, who was captain of the national team during the country's first successful campaign to qualify for the World Cup, in 1982. Club career Sum ...

stretched the Gisborne tally to five. Christchurch had their work cut out to pull back a four-goal deficit at their home ground, and though this was never likely, the game was an enjoyable one. The score seesawed, with Gisborne twice coming back to equalise after going a goal down to the hosts. Paul Nicholls put the southerners ahead, but Sean Byrne's equaliser took the teams to the half-time break level. In the 75th minute

Allan Carville Allan Carville is a former association football player who represented New Zealand at international level. Carville made his full All Whites debut in a 1–1 draw with Fiji on 14 November 1988 and ended his international playing career with f ...

doubled the Christchurch total, but a late penalty strike from Brian Strutt ensured that the second leg would finish 2–2. The Jack Batty Memorial Trophy for player of the final was awarded to Gisborne City goalkeeper Dave Reynolds. p. 177

Results

Third Round

* Won on penalties by New Plymouth (5-4)

Fourth Round

* Won on penalties by Manukau City (4-1) Christchurch United and Dunedin City both received byes to the Fifth Round

Fifth Round

Sixth Round

* Manukau City won 4-3 on penalties

Semi-finals

Final

Gisborne City won 7-3 on aggregate.

References

Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation New Zealand 1987 page
{{Chatham Cup seasons Chatham Cup Chatham Cup Chatham Cup

Chat Chat or chats may refer to: Communication * Conversation, particularly casual * Online chat, text message communication over the Internet in real-time * Synchronous conferencing, a formal term for online chat * SMS chat, a form of text messagin ...