Victory snatch a Grand Final berth in extra-time thriller with Sydney

In the lead up to this crunch semi-final, Kevin Muscat revealed he’d come up with a new game plan to deal with Sydney.

Thoughts of some bold new tactical flourish abounded; what unlikely manoeuvre would Muscat execute, to undo the league’s best team?

Well, whatever it was, any reliance on Rhys Williams was abandoned when the Victory starting centre back pulled up with a calf strain in the warm-up.

Furthermore, as the rain came teeming down, sending the Allianz Stadium crowd scurrying up the bank of seats towards cover, this new form of Muscat-ball was also forced to adapt to slick and slippery conditions. 

In effect, this new approach looked a lot like the old one, with Victory defending deep and compactly, and counter-attacking with venom.

Sydney began things by passing laterally, with Milos Ninkovic and Adrian Mierzejewski piercing through on occasion, sending ripples of panic through the dark blue ranks.

Melbourne were looking sharp on the break; Leroy George and Kosta Barabarouses were driving forward up the wings. Victory prospered this way, making sudden switches from flank to flank.

Barbarouses hit the post with a thumping angled shot, and was desperately unlucky not to open the scoring.

Moments of early, ravenous Victory pressure are typical of matches between these two teams; generally, even if they’ve conceded, Sydney have survived them.

Indeed, they did here too. A few minutes after Barbarouses hit the post, Sydney won and swung in a free kick from the left wing.

It curled in to meet an onrushing pack of players, and careered off Stefan Nigro’s shoulder, spinning just inside the post, past Lawrence Thomas, and into the goal.

Nigro was a late inclusion, part of the reshuffle that Williams’s injury had forced. It was unfortunate, but his body position indicated he was hopelessly unprepared to deal with the ball in the highly likely event it came to him.

The deficit didn’t last long. Another raking ball set Barbarouses free down the left, with Luke Wilkshire puffing back to cover.

Wilkshire’s late arrival on the scene allowed Barbarouses to drift inside, onto his right foot, intending to shoot.

Shoot he did, and a wicked deflection off Jordy Buijs sent Andrew Redmayne diving the wrong way, helpless as the the ball was redirected past him.

An unfortunate moment for Sydney this time, and the scales were evened up, along with the score. 

The tug-of-war resumed, with Sydney steadily boring in through the Melbourne defence with considered, patient passing, and the Victory cutting through swiftly on the counter.

Here, Carl Valeri and Terry Antonis were playing crucial roles, shackling Ninkovic and Mierzejewski, shadowing and harassing – especially Ninkovic – everywhere they went.

Obviously, when Sydney’s two most creative players are snuffed out, their ability to unlock set defences is hamstrung.  Ninkovic was roaming liberally – out to the wings, back into defence – in search of the ball. 

Sydney were trying to prise open the middle of the park, and initiated their mechanism to do so as the first half wound down; Josh Brillante and Brandon O’Neill dropped back into the full-back slots, releasing Michael Zullo or Wilkshire forward which, in turn, was designed to drag markers out high onto the flanks, freeing up Ninkovic and Mierzejewski centrally.

It’s a clear, logical tactical mechanism that Sydney tend to engage sporadically, focusing on moments when their opponents’ aggression and focus is waning.

Against a team prepared for it, though, the space left behind the advanced Sydney full-backs can be exploited.

The second half began with a pair of errors; first James Donachie gifted the ball to Bobo, but his cross sailed over all of his teammates, dribbling out for a goal-kick.

Then, seconds later, Brillante squared a limp pass across the field, and it was easily intercepted. The ball was speared in to Berisha, who hesitated, shaped to shoot, but then slyly crossed for James Troisi, who had been darting across the other side of the Sydney penalty area. It was perfectly weighted, and Troisi had a tap-in.

This error exists outside of Sydney’s tactical scheme, but the concession it led to would have a huge effect on how that scheme would be implemented over the remaining 40 minutes.

At around the hour mark, Sydney cranked into a higher gear. Facing elimination, they had plenty of time to equalise, and went about doing so.

Their passing was crisper, their movements made more urgently. Melbourne’s counter-attacks were becoming less frequent, as they eased back into a wholly defensive stance; it felt like this was a perilously premature retreat. David Carney and Matt Simon trotted on.

The Victory defence held, swaying back. Thomas was required to make a wonderful double save, first from a floating header, then from a walloped follow-up shot.

Sydney had a sequence of three straight corners; this was pressure, and if Melbourne could withstand it, their Grand Final place would be wholly deserved.

They managed to until 15 seconds from the promised land.

(Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

The embers of the contest – indeed, of Graham Arnold’s final season, the season that was set to truly cement Sydney as the greatest A-League team ever – were nearly dead.

Sydney, with their last gasping breath, blew them back into life with a final heave into the penalty area. Simon – of course – won the header. Ninkovic showed rare poise to lay off to Wilkshire, who shot from the left side of the box. Thomas parried it, and it spun across to the right, by the byline, where Mierzejewski raced in to meet it.

He smacked a cross back across the face and Terry Antonis, in the most precarious of positions, dangled a leg out and sent the ball flying into his own net. It was an astonishing moment, and Sydney were yanked back away from the abyss, having all but fallen. Extra time.

Under the circumstances, it was impressive the Victory managed to rouse themselves for another 30 minutes at all, sent into a spiral of anguish as they had been by that crushing blow.

Fatigue came roaring into relevance, with Matt Simon the most vigorous player on the pitch – the striker was winning every single aerial duel he contested.

The first extra time period came and went, with Sydney probably the likelier of the two teams. It was bedraggled; David Carney was seen pulling down Matias Sanchez’s shorts after a tackle.

Matt Simon was dragged down in the box, an extremely compelling penalty shout that was apparently cleared by the VAR. Would a cold, still moment of decisive clarity appear before the lottery of the shoot-out?

It would, and it was provided by Terry Antonis, who rumbled up Sydney’s left flank, hared, half-staggering, all the way into the Sydney box, and shot toward goal.

A savable attempt was made impossible to stop by a deflection off a lunging foot, bouncing it down into the turf and over Redmayne.

Antonis roared away to dive into the away supporters. He emerged tearful. Two Victory coaching staff were sent off for racing onto the field in celebration, and getting into a fracas with Carney.

(Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images)

This was football at its most dramatic, as wracked with anguish and ecstasy as any masterwork, overflowing with spellbinding irony and torturous comedy, an image of the sport with which we can’t help but fall hopelessly in love.

Melbourne won 3-2 in extra time, and Kevin Muscat dashed onto the pitch to embrace his players. They will face Newcastle in next week’s Grand Final.

Antonis after the match: “I can’t describe it … I can’t explain it.”