The Western Sydney Wanderers and Melbourne Victory faced up for block bluster Saturday night clash with huge finals implications, the Wanderers showing heart and soul to come back from an early 2-0 deficit to run out 4-2 winners with goals to Bozhidar Kraev, Brandon Borrello, Nicolas Milanovic and Marcus Antonsson.
Coming off a bye week, Western Sydney's starting 11 was almost identical to the one that trounced the Mariners 4-0. The exception was the return of the suspended Josh Brillante, who returned to his place at the expense of Dean Pelekanos who dropped to the bench.
Bruno Fornaroli had the best chance of the opening stages, 7 minutes in he had the Wanderers defence at 6s and 7s, spinning one way and the next but his turn to find space had him falling backward and his shot lacked power and was aimed straight at Lawrence Thomas in goal. Arzani had a shot on his left foot in the 22nd minute, a curling effort that Thomas blocked away to Clisby who cleared.
A blistering counter from the Wanderers after a Victory corner began with a perfectly placed long ball from Anthony Pantazopoulos who found Aydan Hammond who drew the lone Victory defender and hit Sapsford with a low cross, his shot smashed into the crossbar but his blushes were spared by an offside flag as Hammond had gone early on the initial through ball. Not long after there was an extended injury break as Sapsford went up for a header at the far post against Kasey Boss and the two collided with a heavy impact, Sapsford sending Bos to the ground. The defender had blood pouring from his nose, he was eventually taken off the pitch for treatment and a new set of clothes.
Victory retained possession despite their temporary disadvantage and then taking the lead seconds after the numbers equalised in the 33rd minute. Reno Piscopo was taken down outside the area by Priestman, the ball coming off his back and bouncing away fortuitously to Nishan Velupillay. Alex King played advantage while Velupillay made the Wanderers defence look stupid, with 6 defenders in the box and only Velupillay as a threat, the defence were fooled by his footwork and when he cut back onto his right and shot there wasn't a defender in the way to block it. The shot was hard and fast and right on target, beating Thomas and smashing into the side netting.
Oscar Preiestman sparked another counter, Sapsford running from halfway with the ball and creating a 3 on 2 opportunity. It looked like he had blown the chance when he ignored a run from Hammond to pass to Borrello until Borrello played a reverse through ball back to Sapsford. There was just enough time for Mitch Langerak to rush out from his goal to smother the chance down low.
Victory doubled their advantage with 5 minutes to play, Clisby made a mess of defending a run from Arzani, leaving Kraev to try and deal with the attack, he failed miserably and the rest of the defence couldn't stop the hard cross to the back post where Piscopo couldn't miss from a yard out.
The 2 goal lead lasted seconds. A Wanderers corner saw everyone but Ryan Teague & Kraev get sucked into the near post area, but the ball was aimed at the penalty spot. Teague drifted away from Kraev and with no-one on the posts Kraev took the golden opportunity to plant a left foot volley in the back of the net to make it 2-1. It was the final major action of the half and the Wanderers went into the break down a goal, when the match resumed Alen Stajcic had hooked Hammond and sent Nicolas Milanovic on in his place.
Arzani almost gave Victory the perfect start to the half, he made Clisby look stupid, cut back and found Velupillay, who beat Thomas but not the feet of Pantazopoulos who was in the right place at the right time to clear the shot off the line. Bonetig had his own goal line clearance from Hamill's header at another corner.
The typical hour changes came for both sides with two subs each. Arzani & Piscopo existed for Zinedine Machach & Santos Rodrigues. The Wanderers brought off Sapsford & Clisby for Marcus Antonsson & Alex Gersbach. Machach injected himself into the action quickly, played in by Fornaroli his dragback fooled Pantazopoulos, he fired a low shot across the goal mouth, Thomas threw himself down to his left and pushed the shot away. Fornaroli departed the contest in the 73rd minute with the 29 year old former Greek youth international Nikos Vergos on and looking to add to his 4 A-league goals this season.
Borrello had been inching closer toward making an impact on the scoreboard the entire game, and finally did so in the 77th minute. Priestman found Gersbach with the freedom of the left wing and his cross was perfect for Borrello. He leapt unmarked and made no mistake with a header down and into the far corner to level the scores that was punctuated with a backflip! Stajic managed to get himself booked in the 83rd minute for some apparent backchat to the referee. Stajcic then injected some Spanish class into the fire, bringing on Juan Mata for Priestman for the final 5 plus stoppage time. Antonsson almost put his side in front, an attack begun by Mata, Gersbach found the Swede in the middle but the shot couldn't beat Langerak.
Mata was bought in to win the game and he might have done exactly that with a wonderful ball over the top of the Victory midfield. Antonsson fought hard to get the front position against his defender and bought it down beautifully, he couldn't find his own shot instead finding Milanovic, the ball was on his favoured left foot and he found just enough room to shoot and blast past Langerak, sending the crowd into raptures and earning a yellow card with the shirt off celebration. Borrello made way for the final two minutes of stoppage time, an immense performance that deserved the slight early mark in order for Jarrod Carluccio to run himself into the ground in the final seconds.
Milanovic and Antonsson combined to put the final nail in the coffin for the Victory, a sweeping counter-attack after Victory threw 8 men forward searching an equaliser. Bonetig's clearance fell for Milanovic, he was not far from his own penalty area but he turned and ran at Roderick, dribbling past and leaving Hamill to sprint across in cover, picking out a perfect ball past the final defender for Antonsson, Langerak rushed out to the edge of the box but Antonsson found the cute chip over the top of the keeper and ran off to celebrate and the ground erupted in a cathartic exultation of joy of the now certain win.
In the tight confines of the pack chasing Auckland FC it was a vital three points to send the Wanderers up to 3rd place, pending the Sunday games, going into an international break.
There is an international window next weekend, with the Wanderers next match on Saturday the 29th of March against the Wellington Phoenix in Wellington with kick-off at 3pm Sydney time.
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