NPL NSW Men’s/FNSW League One Men’s – Promotion Relegation – Second Leg Preview

After a thrilling first leg, we’re ready for the second leg with Central Coast Mariners playing host to SD Raiders this Friday night. 

With a position in the National Premier Leagues Men’s NSW competition on the line in 2026, both sides come in with reasons to believe after last weekend.

We’ll start with the hosts for this one in Central Coast Mariners who will come in as slight favourites with home advantage on their side. Indeed, this is where they won this playoff last season with a 4-0 demolition of Bulls FC Academy at Pluim Park last season.

Two players who featured on that night and once again last week were Arthur De Lima and Bailey Brandtman who both scored last weekend. De Lima scoring a stunning strike to equalise late in the first half before Brandtman put them ahead early in the second half.

However their was a sense that they missed an opportunity last weekend with a player advantage for the final twenty minutes even conceding a goal in this period. Will that spur them onto a response here or will they live to regret this after the final whistle here?

Their record is mixed at home this season with three wins, three draws and six defeats at home in the NPL Men’s season.

Which brings us to SD Raiders who perhaps will use that period of play I just mentioned in the second leg here. However like the Mariners, there were positives and negatives from the game last weekend.

Talk to any coach in the Football NSW system and they’ll tell you the importance of taking moments in front of goal. Something SD Raiders weren’t quite able to do in the first half while they were in the ascendancy despite a Riley Cox-Barlow goal inside a quarter hour.

They will be without a key player this weekend in Cooper Hanagan who picked up two yellow cards in the space of five minutes against the Mariners, most likely replaced by Yonatan Sebhatu in the starting line up for this one.

SD Raiders won their last four games on the road this season and can look back on victories against Bulls FC Academy and Newcastle Jets as inspiration for this game this weekend.

You can catch all the action from this one on the Football NSW YouTube page under the live tab this Friday night with Pete Prior in commentary.

Central Coast Mariners (2) v (2) SD Raiders; Friday 12 September, 7:30pm, Pluim Park

By Justin Smith