mack Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 A "Western Derby" saw the Western Sydney Wanderers travel to Ballarat in Victoria to take on Western United on Sunday afternoon, with Jordon Mutch taking advantage of a terrible defensive error to slot home the only goal of the match. The major pre-game drama involved the Wanderers coach Carl Robinson, who took ill on the morning of the game and remained in Melbourne while his team travelled down the freeway to Victoria's south-west Assistant Kenny Miller took Robinson's place in the technical area. Keanu Baccus was dropped to the bench after his horror show in the last game, Jordon Mutch made his first start for the Wanderers and James Troisi took up the attacking midfield role. An early chance fell to Bernie Ibini in the 10th minute, he nodded down a wide free kick testing the Western United keeper but not beating him. The home side had their own try not long after, with a fast break that ended with Connor Pain firing a shot in from a very narrow angle. Alessandro Diamanti attempted an audacious volley from well outside the penalty area but it flashed miles over the bar. Besart Berisha fashioned a goalscoring chance despite being outnumbered 2 to 5, receieving the ball he turned on his defender and shot low and hard. Daniel Margush was well positioned and collected it easily. Graham Dorrans fired back from 25 yards, causing a deflection that momentarily worried the keeper. Diamanti tried another long range effort and replicated his earlier finish, well over the bar. On the half-hour Dorrans was very unlucky not to open the scoring, Ibini and Duke managed to knock the ball down into the path of Dorrans and his shot took a deflection that almost beat Kurto. After it was cleared a scramble saw Bernie Ibini try to turn the ball home at the near post, he missed but Aaron Calver hit Kurto in the head with a stray knee as he dived in for a block. Kurto remained on the turf to take a concussion test from the club physio. He failed the test and was replaced by Ryan Scott who made his second A-League appearance, with his first coming in identical circumstances against Adelaide United in March 2020. The delayed blunted a measure of momentum for the Wanderers and let Western United regroup. Steven Lustica the former Wanderer was booked for a clear drag-back on Ibini. Ibini then found space outside the penalty area but his shot rose off the boot and kept rising until it reached the construction zone behind the goal. Jordan Mutch nearly pulled a scorpion kick goal out of the locker just before half-time, a cross in was behind the midfielder and Mutch stuck out the leg and turned it toward goal but not accurately enough to trouble the scorers. As the 5 minutes of stoppage time were indicated by the fourth official, Dylan Pieras sucked Mark Natta into a poor challenge and the Wanderers central defender was given a yellow card for it. Diamanti delivered a corner to the back post and found Tomoki Imai, although he was falling backward he generated enough power to really trouble Margush and forced the keeper into a diving scrambling stop that rolled over the byline. Controversy reigned in the final seconds of the half. Bernie Ibini took the ball inside the penalty area, Aaron Calver did a blatant shirt pull while Andrew Durante also knocked him from behind. It clearly impacted on Ibini's shot but the referee gave nothing, while VAR cleared the foul in the 15 seconds between the foul and half-time being blown. It was a clear and obvious error on just the shirt pull alone, with two further fouls committed as Ibini was going to shoot. Unlike VAR calls that go against WSW, the ref didn't stop the game, didn't walk over to spend 5 minutes reviewing slow motion replays from bad Fox Sports camera angles while the VAR Bunker tells him to change his mind. Scott made his first action of the game in the second half, Ibini held up the ball to play Troisi and his lofted short range cross was met with a volley from fullback Daniel Wilmering. It was fast but straight at the keeper down low. The Wanderers first change of the game was forced through injury, Mark Natta who was already on a yellow card suffered a quad strain. With no recognised central defender on the bench Keanu Baccus was bought on and the Wanderers moved to a more regulation four at the back formation. Jordan Mutch opened the scoring in the 56th minute after Jerry Skotatis made a horrific error trying to play the ball back to the keeper. He made a complete hash of the pass-back, it dribbled a meter or so and Mutch was reward for his closing down with a saloon passage into the penalty area, his side foot placed shot beat the sub keeper to make it 1-0 to the visitors. The Wanderers did a double change after the goal, bringing on Kwame Yeboah and Bruce Kamau in place of Ibini and Troisi. In the 65th minute Pieras sent the home supporters into raptures with a ghost goal. His curling strike beat Margush and looked to have nestled into the bottom corner but instead it hit the goal stanchion and rolled onto the rear side of the netting. Mitch Duke pulled up sore with an apparent leg injury and he left the field for Simon Cox, with goal scorer Mutch replaced by Nicolai Muller. Western United built back into the game after the subs broke the speed of the play, Berisha had a chance for a very short range header and looped it over the crossbar. Margush was called into action again 10 minutes from full time. When the rest of the defence failed to stop a long throw being flicked on at the near post, Margush was strong with his hands to keep the ball out. Simon Cox almost doubled for the Wanderers, he got onto the end of a long bomb cross from Yeboah, it would have beat the keeper but a late intervention from the defence stopped it from finding the net or flashing across goal for a Muller tap-in. Muller had his own opportunity when he smashed a short-range volley over the bar. The fourth official somehow found a 6 minute long stoppage time and United should have equalised with a point blank header only for the United attacker to find Margush from a few meters out. The Wanderers should have then buried the game as they broke fast up the other end, Yeboah and Kamau combined and Yeboah practically shot the cover off the ball only to rattle the woodwork. If he'd found Kamau in the middle he might have had a tap-in to seal it. The late pressure from United was met with a stoic, uncompromising defence with the Wanderers throwing themselves at the ball and when required, through the opposition players. The clearly excessive 7 minutes of stoppage passed with waves of United attack but they couldn't breach the Red & Black wall and having taken all three points, the Wanderers benefiting from other results to fly up the A-League table to take 3rd place on 16 points, 5 from the Mariners in first and ahead of Adelaide United on goal difference. It may not have been the prettiest game for the visitors but they held fast, worked for each other and had enough chances to say they deserved the close win. It is the first win for the Wanderers outside New South Wales in 436 days and a welcome relief after the poor form of last month. The Wanderers next match is against Wellington Phoenix at Parramatta on Monday March the 15th. View full article Unlimited, sonar and GunnerWanderer 3 Link to comment
HillsPanther Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Where's the yellow for the dive by Berisha? alexd 1 Link to comment
jockman Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 1 minute ago, HillsPanther said: Where's the yellow for the dive by Berisha? He is a cheating diving chunt. He should have got a yellow for the dive and a red for his tantrum when he got substituted. alexd and EmMac 2 Link to comment
Sithslayer1991 Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Happy with the win.... BUT the question remains with our attack we could have killed this game off 3 times over. Take the gift from Ballarat and great defensive effort WHACKO, alexd, sonar and 1 other 4 Link to comment
sonar Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Good win. We ain't Barca but we aren't the worst in this league. Got a decent break till the next game. Great defensive effort by us. COYW ! alexd, jockman, wendybr and 2 others 5 Link to comment
tardotz Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 4 minutes ago, HillsPanther said: Where's the yellow for the dive by Berisha? Or Diamanti when he attacked Cox alexd, sonar and TwoLeftFoots 3 Link to comment
Frankos187 Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Did Cox have his shirt? Yes. Was there enough force for him to fall forward? No Watch in slo-mo and it looks like a pen. Watch in real time and it’s clear you see a delayed dive. Glad VAR was having none of it. Speed and Archie on the other hand.... meryn, alexd and mack 3 Link to comment
Hughesy Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 That’s such an important win and Wellington did us a big favour too. If we can keep picking up points against teams with games in hand it’ll improve our prospects significantly. meryn, wendybr, MistahCampoy and 4 others 7 Link to comment
jockman Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 3 minutes ago, Frankos187 said: Did Cox have his shirt? Yes. Was there enough force for him to fall forward? No Watch in slo-mo and it looks like a pen. Watch in real time and it’s clear you see a delayed dive. Glad VAR was having none of it. Speed and Archie on the other hand.... The ongoing blatent bias against us is so frustrating..however for once the VAR was consistent. sonar, alexd, meryn and 3 others 6 Link to comment
HillsPanther Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 12 minutes ago, Frankos187 said: Did Cox have his shirt? Yes. Was there enough force for him to fall forward? No Watch in slo-mo and it looks like a pen. Watch in real time and it’s clear you see a delayed dive. Glad VAR was having none of it. Speed and Archie on the other hand.... As soon as Berisha felt the hand on him, he pulled away and went down to try and make it look like more than it was. I don't take much notice of the bias idiots in the Fox commentary team. alexd and jockman 2 Link to comment
GunnerWanderer Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 33 minutes ago, sonar said: Good win. We ain't Barca but we aren't the worst in this league. Got a decent break till the next game. Great defensive effort by us. COYW ! Yes defensively look much better this game. Good to see as that was looking good start of the season. we did the basics a bit better today and margush saved well when he needed to. everyone put in a good shift, what a few days difference in the world of football! really hope mueller gets a start next week with duke, dorrans and mulch. enjoying my scotch tonight instead of drinking too forget the match 👌 MajorMelons, LeeMarvin, alexd and 9 others 12 Link to comment
GE942150 Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 I only caught the highlights. Did Dukes injury look serious or just a stinger? Link to comment
MajorMelons Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 I think we look better with 4 at the back. StringerBellend, Potkorok, sonar and 1 other 4 Link to comment
sonar Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 (edited) 19 minutes ago, GE942150 said: I only caught the highlights. Did Dukes injury look serious or just a stinger? Leg was iced up ....more a precaution I think. If he's out next game hopefully Kamau starts. We look so much more dangerous when he's on. Edited March 7, 2021 by sonar alexd, Potkorok, jockman and 2 others 5 Link to comment
THEWANDERERSPOST Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 (edited) That performance and result were good and a surprise, thought we were going to get smashed. Too much negativity on here at the moment for the performance. We defended resolutely and created many chances, just got to start putting them away. Some of our goal bound efforts were just unlucky not to go in. Most players put in a shift today bar a few. Thought Russel and Troisi were poor tonight as was Baccus when he came on. Great to see Mutch get a goal (even if it was from a terrible error). He still had a lot to do, was a good finish and a lot of other players would have totally stuffed that up. Clean sheet will give Margush and defence lots of confidence, they threw themselves at everything. Kenny Miller made the right calls tonight and thought we got a deserved win, think we got close to the 90 minute quality performance we desire (reckon we got 70-80 minutes). By no means were we perfect but we did what we needed to do and played some alright stuff. Hopefully injuries aren't anything major and we move on to a big couple of games coming up! Edited March 7, 2021 by THEWANDERERSPOST EmMac, MajorMelons, BoyFromTheWest and 4 others 7 Link to comment
Paul01 Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 16 minutes ago, THEWANDERERSPOST said: That performance and result were good and a surprise, thought we were going to get smashed Wouldn't have won if Sanchez was not suspended. Finally a result in the white kit. Link to comment
THEWANDERERSPOST Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 4 minutes ago, Paul01 said: Wouldn't have won if Sanchez was not suspended. Finally a result in the white kit. You can't prove that, good players can have sh*t games or be non-influential on the game. EmMac, StringerBellend, MathyouWSW and 1 other 4 Link to comment
MartinTyler Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 5 minutes ago, Paul01 said: Wouldn't have won if Sanchez was not suspended. But he was and we did ...still unbeaten away !! THEWANDERERSPOST, alexd, Paul01 and 8 others 8 3 Link to comment
Keithie Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 But Sanchez did not play and we won and if he did Play Mutch would have cleaned him up Ya know Western United are a pretty average side without Diamanti he is the stand out best A league import ever , they don't sneeze down in West Melbourne without Diamante telling or showing how. Link to comment
MathyouWSW Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 I just want to point out that Mars Stadium looks horrible. But, it looks like it's getting an upgrade, is that right? Link to comment
MathyouWSW Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Also, Santalab is never welcome back to the Wanderers after him tweeting this: TwoLeftFoots, Sithslayer1991, GunnerWanderer and 4 others 7 Link to comment
Upthehill Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 2 hours ago, MathyouWSW said: Also, Santalab is never welcome back to the Wanderers after him tweeting this: Unfortunately he’s right though. People here seem to want to justify it but if that had been Duke at the other end we be screaming bloody murder. Potkorok, Hughesy, StringerBellend and 4 others 7 Link to comment
Paul01 Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 3 minutes ago, Upthehill said: Unfortunately he’s right though. People here seem to want to justify it but if that had been Duke at the other end we be screaming bloody murder. And there was the penalty shout for Ibini that was not given. alexd, THEWANDERERSPOST, GunnerWanderer and 7 others 10 Link to comment
Westiesarebesties Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Lucky to win that, we’re showing our true quality. Looking like we’ll be 8-10 end of season, our position on the ladder is extremely flattering at the moment. Link to comment
Zelinsky Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 11 hours ago, Frankos187 said: Did Cox have his shirt? Yes. Was there enough force for him to fall forward? No Watch in slo-mo and it looks like a pen. Watch in real time and it’s clear you see a delayed dive. Glad VAR was having none of it. Speed and Archie on the other hand.... He was setting the stage for a penalty call in the first half, when he was complaining to King about shirt pulling. As an observation: Magush, Gordon, Dorran, Mutch, Troisi, Duke, Ibini - the senior players CR signed were all in the starting line up. Miller's presser, in short: team has character, controlled the game until the goal, have to be more clinical and put the game to bed. Troisi may not have blistering games, but with him on the pitch (plus Dorrans and Mutch of course) we exercise control in midfield. That's something we arguably haven't seen at WSW since S4. meryn, StringerBellend, EmMac and 5 others 8 Link to comment
StringerBellend Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Not to go all Craig foster on you, but we definitely look better with 4 at the back, and Kamau playing wide more of that Carlo Liv, sonar, EmMac and 1 other 4 Link to comment
pseudonym Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 52 minutes ago, StringerBellend said: Not to go all Craig foster on you, but we definitely look better with 4 at the back, and Kamau playing wide more of that Carlo Was the decision to play 4 at the back Miller's call? Or did Carlo plan on doing that before becoming ill? I can see us stuffing up against Wellington again rendering this result meaningless if they go back to 3 WHACKO, sonar and Potkorok 3 Link to comment
LeeMarvin Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Interesting to hear Miller in the post game remark that Mutch has been "Bolding up his fatness". GunnerWanderer, jockman, wendybr and 1 other 2 2 Link to comment
BoyFromTheWest Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 I don't think there was a huge choice re: going to back 4. Either put DG in Natta's place or go to back 4. We had no dub CB's. I confess I was more nervous with the back 4 as they had attackers free. We coped well, though. I'm not convinced that one is better than the other. I think both have advantages and disadvantages - it's really about how we work with the systems and at the moment I reckon we are still trying to help and know each other's roles and strengths. So many new players in late... jockman 1 Link to comment
WSWJACK Posted March 7, 2021 Share Posted March 7, 2021 Is Dan G on the outside? thought he would figured somewhere during that game. jockman 1 Link to comment
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