Rovers Victors In Bruising Inner-West Derby
UQFC 0 Taringa Rovers 1 (Sekulic 32’) HT 0-1 Played at Cubberla Creek Reserve
Taringa Rovers remain top of Capital League One, increasing their lead to four points, when they beat UQFC 1-0 in a bruising Inner-West derby at Cubberla Creek Reserve on Saturday night. Milan Sekulic scored the only goal in the 32nd minute, taking advantage of some inept defending by the Students and calmly placing the ball home from a tight angle. By that time however, the game had already been delayed by lighting failure in the fifth minute with the home side dominating possession from kick off. Whether that had any effect on their momentum became a moot point seven minutes after the restart when Dylan Balarezo retaliated after a hefty challenge and was sent from the field by referee Dylan Lambert. Credit must go to both clubs for the gripping game which emerged between two teams with genuine designs on getting promoted back to the Flight Centre Premier League. Heavy challenges were the order of the day with genuine chances being few and far between. Midway through the second half UQFC came closest to equalising when a corner was swung in and landed inside the six yard box but the ball was swept across goal and agonisingly wide of the far post Shortly after, Ollie Akinboye finally got in behind the Rovers defence but Taylor McGill was on hand to save brilliantly at the attacking midfielder’s feet. At the clubhouse end, Morlee Kronneh almost wrapped up all three points in the 76th minute with a stinging shot which rattled back into play off the woodwork with Dilen Ibrahim beaten. Both teams have plenty of positives to take from the game, not least being the closeness of the result in a contest which reflected the genuine derby context of the occasion. Whilst lacking general entertainment value, the tempo and tightness of defending suggests there will be no easy points dropped by today’s combatants. Ultimately, Rovers will be more than happy with the points although the result will be tempered somewhat by the loss of Jarryd Braybrook to a seemingly innocuous injury with no one within ten metres of him, which often leads to an extended period on the sideline.
Coaches Reactions:
Duncan Trevant (UQFC): “Eighty minutes with ten men, one real attack on goal and they scored from our mistake. We are a young team still finding our feet with a long season ahead of us. It was good that we played out the match and only came away with a 1-0 loss. I thought we deserved at least a point from the contest.” Adam Bennett (Taringa Rovers): “It was a tight game. They went down to ten men early in the game so obviously they had to work a lot harder. I thought they were pretty aggressive which surprised us a bit. We had a few hairy moments but we won the important statistics and deserved the win. It’s not the best surface but we’re happy to get out of an away game with the points."
FB Media Player of the Match: Ashvin Tharumanathan (Taringa Rovers)
With spectacular moments hard to come by, Tharumanathan got through a power of work in defensive midfield whilst copping plenty of punishment. His second half performance in particular was vital to his side hanging on to their winning lead.
Match Stats:
Overall Possession: 56% - 44%
Shots on target: 5 - 7
Shots off target: 3 - 7
Corners: 5 - 4
Free kicks: 20 - 10
Offsides: 0 - 6
Yellow cards: 2 - 0
Red cards: 1 - 0
Team line-ups
UQFC: Ibrahim, Manning, Black, Core, Fisher-Smith, Balarezo, Callard, Croll, Prineas, Toussaint, Akimboye. Subs: Aremu, Galloway, Mann, Meyer, Heeney. Taringa Rovers: McGill, Braybrook, Nicolaidis, Crack, Burton, Tharumanathan, Harrison, Jackson, Karambasis, Sekulic. Subs: Ellis, Maher, West, Afuni, Nelson.
Referee: Dylan Lambert
