This was the big match. First hosting second. It was widely regarded as a preview of the
Grand Final. Marconi Stadium was packed to the brim; it was nearly impossible to walk
through the crowd, even if you needed to.
I was lucky to be able to attend; it's a three hour drive from Canberra. Gordon Dunster,
one of the linesman on the night, provided me with a lift to the ground and back home. I
guess this is one of the advantages of being a referee, myself. Also being a memeber of the
media and having a Media Pass allowed me to join the rather packed Press Box.
I have been to the Press Boxes at each of the three Sydney grounds and although the Marconi
box does not rate as the best in size, it has the best position to view the game and the
best catering service. Unfortunately, space was important this night as I was not the only
invader into this box.
Each of the main papers were represented and, taking up about 20% of the box was a
Greek-speaking radio broadcast presenting the complete game live. With the lack of space
more than half the Press were standing. I manouvered myself behind John Economos of the
Australian & British Soccer Weekly. John and I have talked a lot at other games, especially
about how well Mike Lyons is doing with the Canberra Cosmos. He rates Lyons with Dave
Ratcliffe as two of the best coaches in the League.
Before the match commenced a lot of side discussion was about the result from the previous
night where the Canberra Cosmos had recovered from 4-0 down to draw 5-5 with the Newcastle
Knights. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the game and strangely enough no one else
in the box knew anything about the game and what happened. Also a big talking point was the
possible crowd size and the previous crowds at this stadium. Two dates stood out. One was an
NSL double-header which drew around 14,000 and the other was an Australia v Brazil youth
game where the crowd was estimated at near 18,000. Since these two games, the Southern stand
has been built and the capacity has been decreased somewhat.
With the league leading Marconi youth team currently participating in the Viareggio
International Youth Tournament in Italy, the pre-game match was a womens game between
Sydney Cosmos and Marconi-Fairfield. Women's soccer has improved enormously in Australia
and the quality of football in this match showed that. Marconi won 2-0, but the score did not
do justice to the eveness of the the two teams.
Well, I suppose we should get to the main match soon, but of course, this being the Top of the
Table clash, it was going to be shown live on payed TV. These matches always start late, and
this one was not different, comencing at 7:14pm. Still it probably gave those late stragglers
a chance to find that little bit of pavement to stand on for the whole match.
The first half commenced and it appeared from the start that Olympic were here to win while
Marconi needed something to get them going. In the 4th minute, Norm Tome earnt Olympic a
corner. Nick Meredith went over to take it and played a one-two short. He took a shot towards
the near post and Marconi goalkeeper Bobby Catlin misjudged the bounce and let the ball fall away
from him. Derek Poimer was the first to the ball and easily put it into the net. That was 1-0
to Olympic and a big shock to the Marconi fans and Manfred Schaefer on the bench. At least
it was going to break open a game early that may have developed into a fizzer.
The match settled down with the odd attack here and there. In one of the Marconi attacks,
Meredith and Maloney clashed off the ball and this resulted in Meredith being stretchered off.
For Olympic, fortunately he recovered well. Then with the ball near the half-way line, it was
lobbed into the penalty area by one of the Olympic backs. Bingley had a free header and instead of
clearing the ball to safety, put it back up into the air and in a place where Chris Trajanovski
could challenge for it. This he did with Jean Paul DeMarigny. Trajanovski was able to turn with
the ball and volley it into the top right hand corner. 2-0 Olympic and Oh Dear, problem for
Marconi.
In one of the next attacks for Olympic Poimer attempted to go for the ball in a challenge with
Catlin. He dived over the ball and then asked for a penalty. He was rewarded, but not with a
penalty, but a Yellow Card for diving. It took ten more minutes for the next serious attack and
just as Brad Maloney was getting his foot to the ball, so was Meredith to block the volley. A
few minutes later Francis Awaritefe was put through and beat young Ivan Zelic. He chipped over
the advancing George Bouhoutsos but the shot came back off the cross bar. Francis was the
first to get up as all three had clashed when the shot was taken. He volleyed the rebound around
the keeper anly to see it bounce off the right-hand upright.
Moving into extra-time in the first half, Norm Tome had a long shot from out wide just tipped
over the bar. A minute later Kimon Taliadoros was put through by Trajanovski only to see himself
taken out by DeMarigny when he had advanced into the penalty box. DeMarigny was given a Yellow
Card for the tackle. Trajanovski stepped up and put the penalty kick into the top left-hand corner
having sent Catlin the other way. 3-0 Olympic and still the half was not over yet. Well, it
lasted another minute to make it 51'06 for the first half.
What was Schaefer going to say in the Marconi dressing room. Was Ratcliffe going to rest on the
lead and pull players back instead of continuing to attack. Schaefer decided to make two changes
at the break. He took off Harper and Hristodoulou and brought on Zoric and Casserly. Ratcliffe
decided to bring a player or two extra back as was evident by a lot of the play in the second
half.
The play was rather quiet for the first 10 to 15 minutes with a Maloney shot tipped over and
then a DeMarigny shot from long distance also tipped over the bar. The resulting corner saw
Dominic Longo put the ball into the net, but referee Brett Hugo had already blown the whistle
for a foul on Bouhoutsos by Awaritefe. Just after this Ratcliffe made his first change, Augerinos
for the gaol scorer Poimer. After Trajanovski missed a close chance, Schaefer made his third
and final substitute of Stanton for Smith.
A few minutes later as the half started to explode there were two quite exciting incidents. The
first saw a shot stopped with the head of an Olympic defender. Nothing strange you may say, except
the head was only 1 foot off the ground. The rebound was sent across the goal and Maloney tried
an overhead kick that just went wide. Then a through ball in the air saw Awaritefe and
Bouhoutsos challenge for the ball. Francis won and the ball was heading for the open goal. But
then, out of nowhere, and alike what he did against both Sydney United and Canberra a number
of times, Adam Ciantar saved the ball from crossing the line with an overhead kick. The ball
rebounded off the under-side of the post and back into play where Brendan Renaud tried to head
it back into the goal. Unfortunately it came off the cross-bar and away for a goal-kick.
There were two more substitutions, the last for the day, by Olympic during the next 10 minutes.
Alistar Edwards came on for Taliadoros and Bove entered for a hobbling Tome. In the middle of
this Marconi had another chance when a fierce long shot from Bingley took a deflection from
Maloney, but Bouhoutsos was able to smother this without any problem.
Finally, with less than 10 minutes to go, luck came to the Marconi team and when Milan
Blagojevic challenged for a ball and tried to get it back to his keeper, Mathew Bingley easily
intercepted the pass and sent the ball to the right of Bouhoutsos and into the Olympic goal.
3-1 and at least a little respect to the scoreline. Unfortunately for Marconi, Bouhoutsos
accidentaly collided with Bingley after the ball went past and Mathew had to come off
eventually needing 8 stitches in his right leg.
Still with 5 minutes to go the game was not going to die as first Robert Stanton missed with a
free header from a corner for Marconi and then Bove cleared the ball from Awaritefe's feet.
With a few minutes to go, Alistar Edwards was awarded a Yellow Card for time wasting.
Finally in extra-time Olympic thought they had scored again, but the goal was disallowed
because of off-side. The half finished after 47'14.
So, UTS Olympic return to the top of the A League after a break of just a few weeks. They were
definitely the better team on the day. One important point to not about Olympic is their mobility
and their ability to put 7 into each attack in an attempt to overwhelm their opposition.
It was an enjoyable night and I returned home at around 1am on Sunday morning. One last thing
is that the Marconi programme provided a small mention of the fanzine magazine Studs Up.