Gold Coast reclaimed top spot and sent a warning to their A-League title rivals with a classy 1-0 win over Sydney FC at the Sydney Football Stadium on Sunday.

Backing up from their 2-0 win over Newcastle four days ago, United produced another polished display to become the first team to breach Sydney’s defence in six games.

A razor sharp finish from Gold Coast striker Joel Porter in the 19th minute proved the difference while captain Jason Culina never stopped in an inspired performance sure to worry his rivals in the run to the finals.

The win put Gold Coast one point ahead of Sydney with four regular season games remaining and two ahead of Melbourne, who still have a game in hand on the pair.

Culina feels his men are hitting their peak at just the right time and said he was more hungry than ever to help lift them lift the championship trophy on debut.

“There’s not many games to go and I know what it feel like to win a championship,” said Culina when asked about his performance.

“I’m hungry more than anybody to win a championship, but look we’re not talking about that yet.

“We’ve got four games to go but we’re starting to get excited and we’re starting to play some good football.”

The win gave United yet another psychological victory over Sydney heading toward the finals, winning all three of the clashes between the teams this year.

United coach Miron Bleiberg admitted Sydney suffered without injured striker Alex Brosque but felt the scoreline did not reflect his side’s dominance.

“Without taking anything away, Sydney are a good team, well-coached and they didn’t have Alex Brosque but they didn’t penetrate us,” he said.

“We just played with fire, it was our third game of the week, and had we been a bit sharper and maybe the score could have been much higher.”

Gold Coast had looked the more dangerous in the early stages and they took a deserved lead when Porter netted his third goal of the season.

The former Socceroos striker turned beautifully to collect a Tahj Minniecon through ball before powering the ball past Sydney ‘keeper Clint Bolton with his left foot.

Veteran striker John Aloisi gave his all for Sydney but couldn’t apply the finishing touch, while Mark Bridge had an off day and made way for youngster Chris Payne in the 60th minute.

Sydney built some pressure late, but never really looked like scoring in front of almost 15,000 home fans, with coach Vitezslav Lavicka admitting his men were outplayed and captain Steve Corica labelling the performance “sluggish”.

“It just hurts players because I think we were a little disappointing today, we didn’t play our best,” Corica said.

© AAP 2012

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