- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Football was last played at the SCG in an era that would have made Rhyan Grant’s haircut seem socially appropriate.
This was a match that had been a fiery, sparkling affair full of everything positive football can offer. The VAR made an appearance too, and those on the western side of Sydney will be cursing its input.
Rhyan Grant fired off an opening warning shot, scuffing over a chance at the near post with a minute gone. Adam Le Fondre then made good on that warning, lingering just onside during the wash following a free kick.
Played in by a deflected Paulo Retre shot, his first attempt was saved beautifully, but he screwed in the rebound. A piercing thrust to start things off; ah, the derby does send a jolt down the spine, especially one blessed with an early goal.
Milos Ninkovic was giving the Wanderers a lesson in grace and purpose, finding space and receiving the ball with soft feet and the intent to turn. He was being allowed altogether too much freedom; the Wanderers were stunned and staggering after being knocked down in the opening skirmish. A streaking run up the right wing by Jaushua Sotirio provided a moment in which to steady themselves.
Riera and Grant contested back to back headers, identical in nature, the latter of which was called as a foul. A vigorous thrum of physicality was flowing through the evening, carbonated by the baying crowd.
This would be a test of Ruon Tongyik’s defensive discretion, matched up as he was with Le Fondre, the pest on the shoulder. A raking Grant pass found Le Fondre, who brought the ball down perfectly, only for Tongyik to make up the ground and dissuade an accurate shot.
Tongyik has sackfuls of potential, but is let down by the occasional spell of lackadaisical attention; a version of Tongyik consistently engaged and attending to his duties with relish would be a formidable defender indeed.
Le Fondre would be a persistent threat, and the lunging tackle Tongyik used on the half hour mark to snuff out a Le Fondre dash down the wing implied the defender was locked in.
Sydney had their front two, Alex Brosque and Le Fondre, interchanging positions, often sliding over together to combine on the wing, and taking turns filling the central spot. Ninkovic was, of course, sliding inside to affect interior play, and Retre – who started out on the right – was largely situating himself in wide areas.
(AAP Image/David Moir)
It meant, even with Ninkovic sliding inwards, that there wasn’t really a player in the traditional No.10 spot, and as a result, Rashid Mahazi and Keanu Baccus were enjoying space in the middle when the Wanderers had the ball.
The two Sydney central midfielders, Josh Brillante and Brandon O’Neill, were hanging back, cutting off passing supply to the Wanderers’ attacking unit, so although they were seemingly being given time to pick passes, for Mahazi and Baccus had very few passes to pick.
Alexander Baumjohann, having received the ball free from the clutches of the Sydney midfield, played in Sotirio with a gorgeous reverse ball. Sotirio took his run too wide, and could not convert what had, for an instant, looked a certain goal.
Key to the success of the Wanderers’ system was the movement of the front unit; Riera is always an active and mobile target, but Roly Bonevacia and Sotirio had to offer constant movement, running down unlikely channels, to give the passers behind them an opportunity to find them. Bonevacia blazed over in the 32nd minute, with Andrew Redmayne sprawled and defenceless, having just punched clear a cross. He should have equalised.
Brosque couldn’t convert an electric two-man counter-attack with Ninkovic, smacking his shot straight at Vedran Janjetovic.
Baumjohann tried a backheeled volley a minute later. Ninkovic, Le Fondre and Brosque combined slickly down the left, a gorgeous sequence that was threaded through at least four defenders. All you Roarers demanding the league offer up a good advertisement for itself: this was it, a meaty half of entertaining, high-spec, attacking football.
Baumjohann and Ninkovic were staging a mini-duel here; within the crash and roar of the derby they were comparing the softness of their touches, weighing up their ability to sense space, offering up competing glints of skill and craft.
Two excellent play-makers, who were consistently at the heart of their teams’ best moments. Sydney walked back to the pavilion with the 1-0 lead at halftime, with the Wanderers profligate, but not yet deflated.
Sydney had a golden chance to open the second half, a sweeping right-to-left move that ended with Retre striking his shot into an offside Le Fondre from about four yards out. A bullet dodged; there was a sense, for all of their missed chances, that the Wanderers would wilt if they conceded again.
Ten minutes later, and Sydney had their second goal. Bonevacia was the seed for this unwanted weed, giving away a free kick on the right. It was lofted in, bounced around, and then Josh Risdon, dallying with the ball in his own box, somehow contrived to play in Ninkovic.
The Sydney play-maker would have been offside had the pass come from a teammate, but Risdon’s error made his position totally legal. Ninkovic then laid a perfect pass across his body to a streaking Brosque who finished with venom. It was a terrible sequence for the Wanderers, and the stench of their demise filled the air.
(AAP Image/Hamish Blair)
Bonevacia, having been partly at fault for that second Sydney goal, waved away that foreboding smell within a few minutes. A neat one-two move down the right, saw a cross speared in. Jop van der Linden missed a clearance, and Bonevacia saw it roll all the way to him. He struck it, and it flipped over Redmayne’s fingers before nestling in the corner. A lifeline.
A lifeline that was immediately snipped off by the VAR, in yet another bizarre decision. Apparently, Michael Zullo had been blocked off in the build-up to that goal – Zullo had sort of backed into Sotirio, who had been pacing back from an offside position.
It did not look like the kind of glaring error which would warrant a VAR intervention. Chris Beath reviewed the incident on the monitor, chalked off the goal, and awarded a Sydney free kick. Marcus Babbel exploded with rage on the sidelines and was eventually sent off. Everyone set your calendars to ‘zero days since a VAR furore’… what’s that?
They were already at zero? Oh.
Chris Beath explained after the game that the offence was actually offside, that because Sotirio obstructed Zullo, he was affecting the play. Sotirio could have had no clue Zullo was about to suddenly change direction, blindly, and run into him.
The question, though, was was the error obvious? Was Sotirio willingly impeding the defender? Was the degree to which Zullo was prevented from being involved in the play enough to warrant review, let alone the overturn? As a force for clarification, the VAR certainly does prompt a lot of questions.
Bruce Kamau came on for the Wanderers, then later Ninkovic came off for Sydney, but the game was still a little shell-shocked. Baumjohann was toppled by van der Linden, in what looked like a penalty, but was apparently not even a foul.
Beath was unmoved, and the VAR apparently judged the contact to have occurred outside the box, so couldn’t advise a review. Things were decaying slightly, a rather entropic process had been prompted by the overturned goal.
Charles Lokoli Ngoy came on for Sydney. Jordan O’Doherty had arrived as a sub for the Wanderers. This game wasn’t quite over, with 15 minutes to go. Keanu Baccus smashed a header goalbound from a corner, and O’Neill cleared it off the line. Brillante was forced to clear at the back post, with Kamau flying in. O’Doherty struck the woodwork. With the fans dancing the poznan, the Wanderers were fighting until the end.
But it wasn’t enough. Had their goal not been the victim of the VAR in the 59th minute, they might have come storming back. This was an electric game, bristling with chances and coloured with streaks of fluid attacking.
Siem de Jong pulled his hamstring a few minutes from the end, a wholly tragic scene; Steve Corica swore bitterly on the bench, as the Dutchman hobbled over and slumped into a chair, crestfallen, head in his hands. He’ll miss the cup final. It was a wonderful derby that Sydney deserved to win.