Magenta to face Mont Dore in final | Oceania Football Confederation

NOUMEA: Magenta will face Mont Dore in New Caledonia’s championship final this Saturday. The French territory’s reigning club champion have been the benchmark for the past two seasons after capturing the league crown the previous season and adding the French Overseas Territories Crown late last year.

But they will be wary of Mont Dore who won the league in 2002 and have class players such as captain Jean Marc Case, who is perhaps the best all-round player playing in New Caledonia today. Mont Dore easily beat JS Traput 6-1 on aggregate to progress through courtesy of an emphatic 4-0 drubbing of the outer island champion last weekend.

Magenta had effectively qualified after thrashing Baco 5-1 in the first round of the home and away semi-finals, but last weekend Baco exposed some deficiencies in the Magenta defence to win the second round semi 2-1. But this was not enough to turn around the first round result so Magenta advances on a 6-3 aggregate.

There will be more than just the national league title on the line. The New Caledonia national team will also be named after the final and players will be vying for places in the squad for the upcoming OFC Nations Cup/World Cup qualifiers in Solomon Islands in May. After finishing with the silver medal at last year’s South Pacific Games, the New Caledonians face a tough task in getting by top seeded teams Tahiti and Solomon Islands.

In other soccer results, the first round of 16 matches was held for the Cup de Caledonie. There were no notable upsets and four division d’honneur teams advanced to the quarterfinals.

New Caledonia Championship playoffs

Semi-finals – Round 2

AS Mont-Dore – JS Traput 4 – 0

AS Mont Dore progresses to final on 6-1 aggregate

JS Baco – AS Magenta 2 – 1

Magenta progresses to final on 6-3 aggregate

Cup de Caledonie (New Caledonia Cup) round of 16

Olympique (DH) – USC (DH) 6 – 3

AS Auteuil (DH) – GaÃ¯tcha FCN (DH) 1 – 2