Queensland surged into a commanding position in their A-League minor semi-final against Central Coast with a 2-0 away win in the first leg at Bluetongue Stadium on Friday night.
The comfortable win puts the Roar within reach of the preliminary final and means the Mariners will likely need to win by three goals at next Friday’s return leg at Suncorp Stadium due to the away goals rule.
But the Roar are likely to be without hardman Danny Tiatto for the match, after he was controversially sent off with 15 minutes remaining after receiving his second yellow card.
Strikers Mitch Nichols and Sergio Van Dijk scored either side of halftime to continue the Roar’s dominance at Bluetongue since the inception of the A-League.
In seven matches, the Mariners have never beaten the Roar on home soil.
The winner of the tie will face the loser of the two-legged major semi-final between Melbourne and Adelaide, starting Saturday night, in a one-off match for a spot in the grand final.
The game was played in front of the lowest-ever A-League finals crowd of 9,514 and amidst a persistent haze of smoke due to a nearby bushfire after another scorching NSW day.
Mariners striker Dylan Macallister, who played alongside Matt Simon in a two-man attack, had a shot saved by Liam Reddy inside the first minute and missed another chance shortly after.
Mariners midfielder Matthew Osman was the next to strike in the 23rd minute with an absolute rocket from almost 30 metres, but Reddy was again up to the task.
It was the Roar who struck first with their first real chance of the game, when Nichols out-leapt Pedj Bojic at the near post and headed in for his fourth goal of the season.
Tiatto received his first booking in the 31st minute for a lunging tackle on Andre Gumprecht and the Roar had to hand an early shower to Josh McCloughan due to a groin problem.
The Mariners pushed on for an equaliser up until halftime but any momentum was halted when Van Dijk doubled the advantage with a penalty nine minutes after the break.
It was Nichols who won it, after he was taken down in the box by Mariners defender Paul O’Grady.
Van Dijk stepped up and made no mistake with the spot kick to net his 12th goal of the season and 10th in his last 11 games.
Things continued swimmingly for the Roar until Tiatto copped his second yellow of the game in the 75th minute, after what looked a tough decision for a challenge on Macallister, and the veteran was evidently furious as he marched off.
Despite the numbers advantage and several late chances, Central Coast were unable to close the gap and make next Friday’s task any easier.
Roar coach Frank Farina was delighted with the result and vowed his side would not sit back and protect their lead in the second leg.
“I’ve never believed in sitting back and trying to defend a lead,” Farina said.
“If we score up there it’s going to make it very difficult for them.
” … I’m just happy with the result and pretty happy with the way we played.”
But Farina would not be drawn into commenting on Tiatto’s send-off for fear of being fined.
“I’m going to be very boring and say I don’t have a view, because if I have a view I get in trouble, there are eyes and ears in this room,” Farina said.
The Roar are also set to be without defender Josh McLoughan for the second leg, after he was forced off shortly before halftime with a groin problem.
Mariners captain Alex Wilkinson was filthy his side was not able to capitalise on Tiatto’s send-off.
“When a team goes down to 10 men and they can keep the ball like that for the last 15 minutes, it’s just disgraceful,” Wilkinson said.
“It’s just not good enough, we’re a team known for our self-belief and willingness to stick together and we’ve got to get that back if we’re any chance of turning this tie around.”
Both coaches were critical of the patchy Bluetongue Stadium pitch, with Farina labelling it “sick” but but McKinna refused to blame it for the loss.
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