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The Roar

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Jets hit for six in ACL

24th June, 2009
10

An underdone Newcastle crashed out of the Asian Champions League after a 6-0 thrashing by the Pohang Steelers in their round of 16 knockout clash in South Korea on Wednesday night.

Sloppy early defending saw the Jets concede two goals inside the first 16 minutes and the hosts poured on four more in the second half.

Without a competitive game since their last ACL group match five weeks ago, Newcastle looked off the pace against a team in the middle of its domestic campaign.

With defenders Ljubo Milicevic and Nikolai-Topor Stanley unavailable, Newcastle’s re-jigged defence couldn’t subdue the speedy, skilful and more match-hardened Koreans.

Choi Hyo Jin scored a hat-trick and Brazilian striker Denilson tormented the Jets, scoring one and setting up two others.

The Jets played with more confidence and started to created some decent chances as the match progressed as they found their match legs.

Striker Sasho Petrovski went close twice in the last 20 minutes, Jason Hoffman volleyed over once in each half and skipper Matt Thompson curled the ball wide from eight metres out.

But they fell away again defensively in the final half hour in a disappointing end an otherwise-encouraging maiden ACL campaign.

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Denilson opened the scoring when he sent Newcastle goalkeeper Ben Kennedy the wrong way with a ninth minute penalty he won after his shirt was tugged by Hoffman.

The second goal seven minutes later was also a result of poor defending.

Jobe Wheelhouse was dispossessed near the halfway line by Hyo Jin, who sprinted away and rounded Kennedy before slotting the ball home.

Pohang could have had two more before the break, but had a good penalty shout turned down after Kennedy appeared to bring down Denilson in the box and the Brazilian then had a goal from a free-kick disallowed by a harsh-looking offside decision.

Jets coach Gary van Egmond brought on young striker Sean Rooney after halftime and Newcastle started brightly, with Hoffman having his second volleyed opportunity two minutes after the break.

But hopes of a comeback were snuffed out by a spectacular 56th minute strike by Jae Sung Kim, who was set up by the ubiquitous Denilson.

Hyo Jin added a fourth goal seven minute later, when he wriggled his way into a shooting position and fired home after collecting another Denilson pass.

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He completed his hat-trick with a 65th minute header which looped over Kennedy.

Macedonian striker Stevica Ristik came off the bench to blast a sixth goal inside the last five minutes.

“It was very disappointing obviously, we copped two goals in the first half which were from our own bad defensive mistakes,” van Egmond said in his post match press conference.

“The first one is a penalty and the second one is a mistake at the back which allowed Pohang to score.

“From there you are looking to try and press.

“In the second half we played with two up front and you are trying to force the game a bit.

“Pohang played it very smart they’ve got some very good players to play on the counter and exposed us defensively.
“It’s a shame in regards to the result, because of a lot of good work that we have done in the group stage, for us to go out this way.

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“But again I want to give Pohang full credit.”

Van Egmond conceded Newcastle had not had a smooth buildup to the one-off tie.

“We’ve not had the best of preparation because of the fact our domestic season was not on,” van Egmond said.

“We’ve got a number of injuries to key players which obviously doesn’t help our cause as well.

“But at the end of the day, we were naive in our defending and, where in prior games two or three of our players really stepped up and played outstanding, unfortunately today it was probably the opposite.”

He said the Jets players would have a brief break before resuming pre-season training on July 6.

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