Round 13 of the A-League, saw the Reds play their 2nd home game in 4 days, this time against Queensland challengers Brisbane Roar. The Roar being coached by Adelaide Socceroo’s legends the Aloisi brothers ensures the match always has a feisty feel. Unfortunately this season the Roar resemble the Reds from 12 months ago, winning very little and lagging towards the bottom end of the table, for a club with a rich A-League tradition, they are having a rough season.
As has happened so many times this season, the A-League delivered another non predictable result, with clear underdog the Roar grabbing the 3 points. The Roar being comprehensively outplayed and trailing the Reds on every conceivable stat (barring Red Cards) however grabbed a sneaky 2-1 victory. They will take the 3 points and head home to Brisbane hoping the New Year’s brings a serious change of fortune.
The Reds in absolute domination gifted the lead to the Roar in the 33rd minute, when Isaias attempted a poorly played pass back to the keeper, that was miss hit and intercepted by Ben Khalfallah and he easily slotted it past an unsuspecting Izzo. Passing back when not under pressure amateurish error, I am sure Isaias is cursing himself tonight with that primary school blunder. Right on the crack of half time Ben Khalfallah played a through ball to Maccarone, who used all his experience to chip it over a defenceless Izzo, although Maccarone may be slowing down he is close to 40, the finishing touch was pure ageless class. The first half ended with Matt Mackay being sent off for the Roar, his retaliation for a misplaced tackle from Melusnic and retaliating by kicking an opponent while on the ground was picked up by the VAR and the Roar would play the 2nd half with 10 men.
As is the case in the world game, 10 can and generally do end up defending well against 11 and press all they want the Reds couldn’t pull back a draw. Blackwood scored the only Reds goal in the 69th when he picked up a deflected shot that came off the woodwork from a Melusnic strike, that he easily tapped into the open goal. For all the domination 27 shots, 73% possession the Reds couldn’t score, too much wasted time on fruitless runs down the wings and holding possession just outside the penalty box with nothing eventuating.
The good thing for the Reds is that they remain 5th and they are only a couple of points off 3rd and their closest competitor Perth, copped a hiding to Sydney. Bring on 2018 and bring on Perth in the next match for Marco’s men.
Player of the match: J.Young the Roars keeper kept the Reds at bay all math and helped his team steal a win from nothing.
Article written by C.Dichiera
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