The 2002 New Zealand National Club Championship, also known, due to naming-rights sponsorship, as the Southern Trust National League was the third season of a nationwide 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. The competition was won by

Miramar Rangers Miramar Rangers AFC is an amateur New Zealand association football club in the Wellington suburb of Miramar. The club is one of the most successful in New Zealand having won the Chatham Cup four times and the National League title twice. Over t ...

. The league was played mainly during autumn, with matches played from February to June, and was run in two stages. In the first stage, each team in the ten-team league played every other team home and away. In the second stage, the top four teams entered a knockout competition, with third place playing fourth place in one match and first playing second in the other, with home advantage being decided by final league position. The winners of the first against second match progressed straight through to the final; the losers of that match met the winners of the other match to decide the other finalist.

Promotion and relegation

Ten teams took part in the 2002 league. Eight of these remained from the previous season. Christchurch City withdrew from the competition, replaced by a composite team,

Canterbury United Canterbury United Dragons are a semi-professional football club from Christchurch, New Zealand. The team plays most of its matches at English Park in Christchurch, though they occasionally play in Nelson. The club last played in the ISPS Handa P ...

, drawing players from all of Christchurch's main clubs.

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were relegated and withdrew from the promotion play-offs against the winners of a competition between the northern, central, and southern regional competition winners. The play-off games between the three regional champions were played at

Newtown Park Newtown Park is a multi-purpose stadium in Wellington, New Zealand, owned and managed by Wellington City Council. It is currently used mostly for football (soccer) matches in winter, and athletic events in summer. Newtown Park is the primary at ...

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 ...

during August and September 2001. The tenth place in the 2002 league was thus gained by

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 ...

Waitakere City Waitākere City was a territorial authority in West Auckland, New Zealand; it was governed by the Waitākere City Council from 1989 to 2010. It was New Zealand's fifth-largest city, with an annual growth of about 2%. In 2010 the council was a ...

finished last in 2002, and entered the play-off series with the winners of the northern, central, and southern regional leagues.

League table

Finals

Bracket

Play-offs

Final

Records and statistics

;Biggest winning margin: *Canterbury United 0, Central United 7 *Central United 0, Tauranga City United 7 ;Highest aggregate score: *Central United 3, Miramar Rangers 5 *Napier City Rovers 5, Tauranga City United 3

References

{{NZNSL New Zealand National Soccer League seasons 1

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