Adelaide United vs Newcastle Jets
Coopers Stadium
February 17, 2017
Friday Night Football saw Adelaide United Vs the Newcastle Jets. The two sides last met just over a month ago, with the jets taking honors then. With the Jets playing their second match in 5 days and with United coming of a big loss, last week, not much was expected of this match up. Perhaps the current situation with the Reds kept the crowd down, but for the 6000 fans that turned out last night perhaps finally, they saw a faint glimpse of what Adelaide can offer on the football pitch. With a solid defense, hard tackling and utilising a lot of youth, Adelaide showed that perhaps they aren’t the cellar dwellers of 2016 and with a bit of confidence and momentum on their side that perhaps they could have been a top 6 side in 2016. Keeper Hall, put in a solid match and kept a clean sheet after a jittery 2 previous matches, with a momentous save that saw him collide with the goal post, but the youthful former Cumberland United keeper is showing he is up to A-League standard and may be a viable Galekovic replacement in the future. Korean import Kim Jae-Sung made his debut, coming on replacing Isaias at halftime, with a thumping strike with in the first 10mins that just missed the goal and settled in quite well in the Reds midfield, although at times the Jets welcomed to Australia with nothing short of Red card hacks.
With Tarek Elrich being brought down in the 61st, it was up to ACL omission Marcello Carrusca to put away to penalty, sealing a 1 nil victory for the Reds. The intensity of the last 20mins was high with both sides having heated scuffles, tackles and attempts on goal. Reds fans finally had something to cheer about with win number 3 of the season, but Jets fans could also be happy with A. Nabbout and M. Leilei showing composure and maturity to control the Jets in the midfield. The Reds move onto the Asian Champions League on Wednesday night at Coopers Stadium and perhaps this little spark could finally ignite some magic against Gamba Osaka.
Words by Cosi Dicheira
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