|
|
|
A-League
Brave Glory Lose in the Rain A-League Season 2005-06 - Round 18 
 lost to Adelaide United FC 2 (Qu Shengqing 3', Ross Aloisi 71')
After an insipid display on Saturday night against Queensland Roar, Perth Glory put in a much improved performance against the league leaders before the smallest home league crowd in Glory's history.
Just 5,033 spectators were present at a rain soaked MES for this Thursday night game, as Adelaide virtually secured top spot on the league courtesy of a 2 goals to 1 victory.
That both Adelaide goals were scored from outside the penalty area once more highlights the concerns of the Glory supporters all season as to the ability of goalkeeper Jason Petkovic to save such shots.
That said both strikes were from the top drawer, although on both occasions the Glory defense must take a fair potion of the blame.
Perth started with Stuart Young in the starting 11 for the first time this season and the veteran striker proved that he is far from a spent force.
His all round performance, especially winning the ball in the air appears to be what Glory has been missing all season and he showed tremendous enthusiasm, which was sadly missing in the last home game.
The chances of Perth playing in the finals are by coach Alan Vests own admission very slim following this defeat. They really need to win their 3 remaining games in order to qualify and considering they are winless in their last 6, that would appear to be too tall an order.
In just the 3rd minute of the game, the league leaders shocked the home crowd when Pantelis found Qu on the left wing. The Chinese striker then waltzed his way past both Coyne and Colosimo before connecting sweetly from 20 meters and firing the ball past a stationary Petkovic and into the back of the Glory net.
To their credit Perth took the fight to Adelaide after this initial shock, and on 14 minutes a great combination between Fa'arodo and Ward finished with the latter crossing the ball for Young to connect with a header at the near post, but Bajic turned the ball over the bar for a corner.
Just 4 minutes later it was Young and Mori combining with again Young getting the final strike with a shot that just whistled past the Adelaide goal.
The pressure kept building on Adelaide and their defense was again severely tested in the 29th minute when Celeski played a ball back to Coyne on the right wing, the full back controlled the ball before crossing it in behind the United defense, where Ward had stolen in and his diving header was again brilliantly saved by Bajic in the visitors goal.
Minutes later it was Young with a header that was turned away for a corner by Bajic and from the resultant corner Adelaide broke like the champions they are, with Vearth racing through on goal before passing to Brain, he was just about to pull the trigger on a shot when young midfielder Micevski produced a goal saving block.
Just before half time Adelaide should have had a 2nd goal when an Aloisi cross was headed goalwards by Valkanis, only for Petkovic to claw the ball away, from what appeared to be behind the goal line, however not for the first time in the match both the referee and assistants missed the vital action and no decision was made.
The 2nd half continued along the same lines as the first, with Glory trying to force the pace, but this time the Adelaide defense strong although Harnwell did get a header in that was cleared off the line. In the 69th minute following a bad mistake by Colosimo it was Vearth running in on goal only for Harnwell to produce the goal saving tackle.
However there was little he could do in the 70th minute, when following an Adelaide corner which Glory failed to clear successfully the ball was played back to Aloisi and from outside the box he blasted the ball, via a deflection past the stranded Glory keeper, Petkovic although the keeper did manage this time to at least get a hand on it, but could not prevent it from scoring.
Glory then took Mori off and replaced him with Hay in a forward role, and got almost immediate results, as from a long ball forward the Kiwi chested the ball into the path of Ward who found the net from 20 meters out.
Try as they might but Glory just could not find the path to goal again in the remaining 8 minutes of the match.
To compound Glory's problems for the upcoming trip to New Zealand, both Celeski and Colosimo picked up their 4th yellow cards and will be ineligible for the match.
So assuming things go well for Adelaide this weekend they could be crowned League Premiers by the weekend or at the very least next week at home to Central coast, where they are, according to coach Kosmina, expecting a capacity crowd.
For Glory, they are probably just playing for pride now, unless this game they call World Football can throw up a few surprises over the coming weeks.
A-League Season 2005-06 - Round 18 Crowd: 5,033
MATCH STATS:
Perth Glory FC
Coach: Alan Vest
Yellow Cards:
Simon Colosimo 4', Billy Celeski 15' Adelaide United FC
: Coach: John Kosmina
Yellow Cards:
Ross Aloisi 8', Adam vanDommele 30' Referee: Matthew Breeze 4/10
BOTN Player Points
:
3. Ross Aloisi (Adelaide) Match
Report by Eamon Duffy
Disclaimer: The content of this report is the responsibility of the writer. Stats are either as recorded by the writer at the game, or as supplied by FFA, or a mixture - no responsibility can be taken for their compete accuracy although we do strive for that. FFA has not this season accredited any Photographers for BOTN, so any photos used here, if unattributed, are as supplied by FFA and used by permission.
Crafted
lovingly by hand |
