A series of defensive lapses combined with awful finishing to see the Western Sydney Wanderers lose 3-1 to Brisbane Roar.
The opening match of the season ended with the away side stealing the 3 points. Jamie McClaren, the new Brisbane #9, scored in the 9th minute, pouncing on a dreadful backpass from Hamill before chipping Andrew Redmayne to open the scoring.
Mitch Nichols gave the 14,000 strong crowd something to cheer just minutes later, as he was played through on goal by Scott Jamieson, before closing in and finishing smartly from an acute angle to level the match at 1-1.
Brisbane were back in front after 22 minutes, new signing Corona whipping a corner to the near post where it was met by Daniel Bowles with a powerful header that the Wanderers defender on the back post couldn't stop going over the line.
Another failure of set piece defence had the Roar take a 3-1 lead into the break, another Corona corner whipped into the near post, the ball bounced against a pair of Roar players before falling neatly into the path of McClaren who had his double by firing home from point blank range. Despite huffing and puffing, Western Sydney weren't able to pull a goal back in the second half and continued their run of 4 opening round matches without a win.
It could be said that the Wanderers had the better control of open play, but football isn't just about open play, two atrocious attempts at set piece defending and the Hamill backpass left the Wanderers with a mountain to climb and it was never going to be easy to get back to level pegging, and it proved such.
The Wanderers need to get their full first team outfit on the park week after week or they will continue to struggle. The ongoing problems in both defensive and offensive set pieces still exist despite another pre-season to work on them, and once again a lack of accurate finishing cost the club any hope of taking points from this match. The one positive of the Thursday kick-off is that there is as much time as possible until the next match.
Recommended Comments
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now