Sydney United 58 record vital victory

SYDNEY United 58 have came away from Sydney United Sports Centre rampant 3-0 winners over APIA-Leichhardt Tigers.

It was a gallant performance from United as they were able to dominate for a large majority of the match and take the three points from their home fixture.

Although the 3-0 score line is reflective of Sydney Untied 58’s dominance, the opening stages of this clash were evenly shared after both sides felt each other out in the opening 10′ minutes.

There were opportunities either side of the halfway line but nothing was created in the first 15′ minutes that put too much pressure on either goalkeeper.

The Tigers looked promising inside United’s half early and Matthew Mayora had a chance inside the box after he was able to create space after some fancy footwork but the shot was well handled by the United keeper Anthony Costa on 20’ minutes

APIA then dominated the next 10′ minute period as they sustained pressure down United’s end of the pitch.

Firstly, Marc Warren received a free kick from thirty yards out and when the shot couldn’t be cleaned up by the Sydney United defence the ball looked as though it might trickle over the line but was snuffed out by some desperate defence.

APIA-Leichhardt’s next opportunity to break the deadlock came just 60 seconds later as Mayora chipped a ball beautifully into the box, heading to Daniel Fogarty’s head, but he was not able to connect and the scorers went untroubled.

The Tigers would go on to rue these missed opportunities as it was Sydney United 58 who went 1-0 up just minutes before half time as a Nathan Sherlock back pass found Stjepan Paric, who from just outside the penalty box, fired a beautiful right footer which curled past APIA goalkeeper Andrew Bazi and found the top left corner in what was a perfect way for United to go into the interval.

United came out all guns blazing in the second half and extended their lead just 6’ minutes after the break as Mirjan Pavlovic found himself with open space inside the box and after dummying a couple of times to shoot was able to create space to get a shot away that went cannoning into the APIA goal.

Over the next 20 minute period, United dominated field position and possession and had many chances to take the game away from APIA and go 3-0 up but they failed to capitalise on these chances.

Then a cracking strike by Pavlovic from 40 yards outs tried to catch the APIA keeper napping but it was just about tipped away. This resulted in a corner and when the Tigers couldn’t clear the ball out of their box, Joel Chianese was able to tap the ball in to put the result beyond doubt.

After the game APIA coach Billy McColl stressed that his team did have opportunities to win the match.

“We dominated the first half, created a lot of chances, then they scored one against the run of play and we never got back into it after that.”

“If we score one, we score three, but we have got to score them and we never did.”

Meanwhile Sydney United 58 coach Mark Rudan was happy with his team.

“The performance was better today, the result was a good one, we changed a couple of things up, with a couple of new players coming in and all in all it was quite good, a start to finish performance but there is definitely a lot of improvement left.”

“We got the lead into the break which I thought was going to be important and at half time we changed a few little things position wise and they did well in the second half although there could have been a lot more (goals).

Match Stats
Sydney United 58 3  (Stjepan Paric 43’, Mirjan Pavlovic 51’, Joel Chianese 89’)
APIA-Leichhardt Tigers FC 0
Sunday 3rd August, 2014
Sydney United Sports Centre, Edensor Park
Referee: Kurt Ams
Assistant Referees: James Tesoriero and Joon Park
Fourth Official: K. Robinson
Sydney United 58: 1.Anthony Costa, 2.Anthony Tomelic (Chris Triantis ’79) 4.Nathan Sherlock, 6.Mitchell Stamatellis, 7.Mirjan Pavlovic , 8.Ante Tomic, 9.Robert Mileski (Alec Urosevski 81’) 12.Ivan Pavlak, 16.Stjepan Paric, 17.Theo Kofinas, 41.Joel Chianese (Richard Darko 90+1’)
Substitutes Not Used: 11.Luka Glavas, 29.Jacob Diacomo
Yellow Cards: Nathan Sherlock 60’, Mitchell Stamatellis 77’, Chris Triantis 53’, Ante Tomic 89’
Red Cards: Nil
APIA-Leichhardt Tigers: 1.Andrew Bazi; 4.Bradley Bartels, 5.Michael West (C), 6.Marc Warren (Jamie Lobb 80’), 7.Stephen Kayes, 8.Bradley McDonald, 10.Franco Parisi, 11.Daniel Fogarty (Luke Clifford 71’), 13.David D’Apuzzo,  15.Matthew Mayora (Matthew Castainuovo) 19.Joe Gibbs
Substitutes not used: 14.Zac Ribiero, 40.Stefan Giglio
Yellow Cards: Blake Powell 11′, David D’Apuzzo 13′
Red Cards: Nil
– By Jack Hislop, National Premier Leagues NSW Mens 1 Reporter, at Sydney United Sports Centre