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Western Sydney claimed the A-League’s Premiers’ Plate in emphatic style with a 3-0 win over Newcastle on Friday to continue their fairytale maiden season and put the final nail in the the Jets’ coffin.
The Wanderers’ triumph makes them the first expansion club in Australian football history to win a trophy in their debut season.
The Jets meanwhile, who needed a win to keep alive their finals hopes, finish the season in eighth place.
Having let the minor premiership slip last week after a 1-1 draw with Sydney FC, the Wanderers weren’t about to do it again with a Mark Bridge brace in the opening half and a late Rocky Visconte missile sealing the win in front of a massive travelling contingent of close to 10,000 Wanderers fans at Hunter Stadium.
The Wanderers will be presented with the Plate in front of a home crowd in their next match – the first semi-final on April 12 at Parramatta Stadium.
Many doubted the heavily depleted side would be up to the task of taking on a fiercely desperate Jets outfit needing victory.
They were missing injured players Shinji Ono (groin) and Aaron Mooy (knee) in midfield and defenders Adam D’Apuzzo (foot) and Jerome Polenz (quad), while versatile Iacopo La Rocca is banned for the rest of the season for his elbow on Sydney’s Terry Antonis in last week’s derby.
But the Wanderers were boosted by the return of skipper Michael Beauchamp and crafty midfielder Youssouf Hersi back from suspension.
It took just six minutes for the Wanderers to signal their intent, and ironically it was three ex-Jets players combining to score the first goal in front of a 22,578-strong crowd.
Tarek Elrich played the long ball with Labinot Haliti sending it across the face of goal for the waiting Bridge who made no mistake with the finish.
Bridge struck again in the 33rd minute, getting on the end of a Dino Kresinger header to get the best of Jets defender Connor Chapman and put the visitors 2-0 up before half-time.
Visconte put the game beyond doubt in the 80th minute scoring his first goal of the season with a 20-metre screamer.
The Jets, who gained marquee man Emile Heskey from a three-week injury layoff, just couldn’t make any real inroads into Wanderers territory to be a genuine threat, with the visitors too quick on the counter-attack and too strong in defence.
They had promising strikes from Marko Jesic and skipper Ruben Zadkovich in the first half, while James Virgili and young gun Adam Taggart attempted shots in the second, but Wanderers ‘keeper Ante Covic was otherwise untroubled.
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