Melbourne Victory vs Western Sydney Wanderers: A-League live scores, blog

That's it for me tonight. Big weekend of football to ponder - the pick being the Man United and Liverpool game on (our) monday morning. Western United's first home game in Geelong against Perth also shapes as an interesting contest! That will really test where they - and the people and facilities at Kardinia Park - are at. Sleep well, and catch you all next week.

MATCH REPORT. The Western Sydney Wanderers get 3 points today after a fantastic second half, sublime finishing and steady defending – especially from new Swiss keeper Daniel Lopar. Second half goals from Keanu Baccus – an absolute banger from range into the top corner – and German legend Alex Meier after a mix up at the back between Lawrence Thomas and Storm Roux, put enormous pressure on Marco Kurz’s men. While Victory pushed for goals and clawed one back from a penalty after Dylan McGowan handled in the box, 2 goals always seemed like a tall order. Try as they might they could not break down the Wanderers effectively, and struggled to contain their run and creativity while in defence from the first minute. The Wanderers’ squad is an archetype for what the FFA imagined when the A-League was being cooked up: a mixture of fringe Socceroos, hardened European veterans in the twilights of their careers, and a sprinkling of under 23 Australian talent. And Markus Babbel’s current mixture worked wonders for him tonight. Parachuting pros like Jurman, McGowan, keeper Lopar and Georgievski into his defence has created a stable platform from which younger players Sullivan, Baccus, Wilmering, Adam and Yeboah can thrive. And with German pros Schwegler pulling the strings in midfield, Duke gut-running across his line and Alex Meier getting on the end of crosses, they have the perfect mix of enthusiasm, pace, cunning and skill. In this game that combination was laid bare and Victory didn’t have many answers. For 60 minutes they pushed Victory out wide and invited crosses in for Jurman and McGowan to gobble up, and in possession they were a constant threat on the counter with the pace of Adam and Duke. The box to box running of Baccus and Sullivan proved too much for Broxham and Poulsen in key moments as they gave up shots and conceded cheap free kicks. Victory’s best passages of play came after the two Wanderers goals when Athiu’s inclusion as a substitute allowed both Toivonen and Kamsoba to push up between the lines to link the play and run at the Wanderers back 4. Indeed those last 20 minutes might have included some “aha” moments for Marco Kurz – namely that Ola Toivonen typically plays best in a front 2 where he can work off another striker. For a big man his touch and passing is excellent and he appears to be missing a Barbarouses this season. The other big takeaway for Kurz should be Kamsoba’s brilliance in that 20minutes when he moved deeper and more centrally. One option for Kurz would be to consider using Nabbout closer to Toivonen and have Kamsoba drop into a midfield 3. Whatever his end assessment of this game, Marco Kurz has a lot to think about after tonight, and after only 1 point from the first two (home) games he will not be pleased with his start with the Victory. MAN OF THE MATCH goes to Elvis Kamsoba. While his team lost and there were many good Wanderers players tonight – Baccus, Duke, Sullivan, Georgievski, even Lopar in goal – there was something transformative about Kamsoba tonight. Tonight’s game was a real coming of age for Elvis, and he went to another level when Victory were pushing for the equaliser – a level not many A-League followers thought he had in him. He was bright, creative, popped up all over the park and was the key link in the chain for all of Victory’s meaningful attacking efforts.

The stats are consistent with the first half and underline the closeness of the contest. The Wanderers ended with slightly more shots (16 v 13) with an extra one on target (4 to 3), but Victory had slightly more of the ball with 58% possession. Victory clicked into another gear after they went behind, but conceding two goals in such quick succession created an uphill battle to get something out of this game.