Sydney FC remain undefeated after playing out a pulsating draw against the Melbourne Victory in front of 21,242 fans at Allianz Stadium.
Summary
Sydney FC 0 drew w. Melbourne Victory 0
Sydney FC remain undefeated in the Hyundai A-League after a pulsating 0-0 draw with Melbourne Victory in front of a record breaking crowd at Allianz Stadium tonight.
Over 21,000 fans created history by helping Sydney FC surpass the 100,000 attendance mark (105,741) for the club’s first four Hyundai A-League games – beating last year’s previous record of 93,778 by almost 12,000 people.
They witnessed the Sky Blues’ fourth clean sheet in a row and could have seen the club take all the points, but Victory keeper Nathan Coe was in form to deny Brosque and Smeltz.
At the other end Sydney FC keeper Vedran Janjetovic pulled off three brilliant saves to deny Melbourne the spoils while goals for both clubs were ruled out in the opening six minutes for offside.
What They Said
Graham Arnold: “I wasn’t happy with the first half yet we could have scored three goals. The second half was much better. It was a good exciting game for the fans, heart attack stuff for the coaches, lots of chances and end to end football.
“Overall we’re always striving to get three points at home and the most important thing is we got something. They had chances and we had ours but the most positive thing is that’s four clean sheets in a row.
“Defensively we are very strong and the courage and the fight from the players is excellent.”
Key Moments
5’ BERISHA GOAL DISALLOWED – Ognenovski gets dispossessed by Thompson as Sydney FC try to play the ball out of defence and the striker runs clear on goal. Supported by Berisha, Thompson approaches goalkeeper Janjetovic and pushes the ball forwards and to his right to Berisha who passes into the empty net. However the Albanian is stood in an offside position and the goal is disallowed.
6’ OGNENOVSKI GOAL DISALLOWED – Ibini delivers a right footed inswinging cross from the left hand side of the pitch and Ognenovski gets across his defender to flick the ball home. Unfortunately he is standing in an offside position as the ball came in.
8’ IBINI VOLLEY JUST WIDE – The ball bounces kindly for Ibini around 25 yards from goal and the forward hits it first time on the volley right footed but it bounces wide.
12’ BEN KHALFALLAH FLASHES WIDE – The striker receives the ball on the left and runs at Ognenovski before drilling the ball left footed across the face of goal and out for a goal kick.
20’ JANJETOVIC SAVE – After a well worked corner which is cleared by the Sky Blues defence, Victory play a chipped ball over behind the back four where unmarked Thompson controls on his chest and shoots first time but Janjetovic saves with his knees.
33’ BRILLIANT SHOT FROM BROSQUE – A cross from the left from Abbas finds Brosque who controls it superbly on his left foot to turn and get clear of his marker and hit a first time shot which Coe just saves with his knees.
34’ SUPERB JANJETOVIC SAVE – Thompson beats the offside trap and has time to control the ball and turn to face Janjetovic in the left hand channel of the box. He hits it right footed and Janjetovic flies to his left to push wide.
42’ BROSQUE FIRES OVER – A brilliant run from Dimitrijevic beating three players before playing a threaded ball putting Alex Brosque in the clear. As the striker controls and prepares to shoot, the ball bobbles slightly and his left foot strike blazes over.
44’ BRILLIANT JANJETOVIC SAVE – Berisha gets clear on the left and prepares to shoot at Janjetovic but passes to his left to Khalfallah who shoots but the keeper flies across his goal to save and keep it 0-0 at the break.
56’ DIMITRIJEVIC CLIPS THE BAR – Abbas wins a free kick on the edge of the box and Dimitrijevic curls it over the wall skimming the top of cross bar.
58’ SMELTZ HEADER SAVED – Ibini gets down the right hand side and crosses to Smeltz who smashes a header straight at Coe.
Team News
Sydney FC 0 drew w. Melbourne Victory 0
Head Coach Graham Arnold was forced to make three changes to his squad following the international call-ups of Marc Janko and Corey Gameiro, while Terry Antonis was not permitted to take to the field due to FFA regulations over international call ups. Hagi Gligor replaced Antonis to make his first start of the season while Shane Smeltz also made his first start of this campaign having come in for Marc Janko. Alex Brosque returned from an ankle injury to fill the void left by Gameiro. On the bench Peter Triantis joined Pedj Bojic, Alex Gersbach and Nick Carle.
Ground: Allianz Stadium
Referee: Peter Green
Attendance: 21,242
Sydney FC: 20. Vedran JANJETOVIC, 2. Seb RYALL (4. Pedj BOJIC 74’), 3. Sasa OGNENOVSKI, 6. Nikola PETKOVIC, 8. Milos DIMITRIJEVIC, 9. Shane SMELTZ, 11. Bernie IBINI, 12. Hagi GLIGOR (18. Peter TRIANTIS 45’), 13. Christopher NAUMOFF (16. Alex GERSBACH 45’), 14. Alex BROSQUE, 22. Ali ABBAS.
Subs Not Used: 1. Ivan NECEVSKI, 19. Nick CARLE.
Yellow cards: Ryall 61’, Triantis 81’,
Red cards: None.
Melbourne Victory: 1. Nathan COE, 6. Leigh BROXHAM, 7. Gui FINKLER (13. Andrew NABBOUT 78’), 8. Besart BERISHA, 10. Archie THOMPSON, 14. Falid Ben KHALFALLAH (31. Keiran DOVER 93’), 16. Rashid MAHAZI, 18. Dylan MURNANE, 21. Carl VALERI, 22. Jesse MAKAROUNAS, 23. Adrian LEIJER.
Subs Not Used: 20. Lawrence THOMAS, 26. Jordan BROWN, 33. Christian CAVALLO.
Yellow cards: Murnane 63’,
Red cards: None
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