"It was a great match to watch." That was the first comment by Marconi coach Manfred
Schaefer. This was probably one of the better matches in Sydney this season, bar some
of the derby games over the last months. Canberra always come to entertain, and they
nearly did more than that. Down 2-0 with 30 minutes to go, they litterally pushed
players forward and not only pulled the goals back, but nearly won took away the three
points, something that would not have been unjustified.
The visitors were plaing a rather strange lineup of 5 backs,
one being a sweeper, 1 true midfielder and 4 forwards. Actually, one of these forwards
was dropped back to the midfield. The visitors were also missing both Jason Dunn and
Paul Wade through suspension, while the home team were without livewire striker Francis
Awaritefe for the same reason.
Following a rather quiet start as each team was feeling out their opponent, Marconi took
over and forced the pace. In the 15th minute Vlado Zoric sent a through ball into the
Cosmos box for Andrew Harper to latch onto. He sent the ball past the Cosmos goalkeeper,
Anthony Giannasca, to give the home team a 1-0 lead. Only a few minutes later, Marconi
nearly doubled their lead when John Koch's interception of a Mathew Bingley cross to
Harper went just agonizingly wide of the near post.
From about half-way through the first half, the tide started to turn back to the Cosmos
as they went searching for an equalizer. Chances went to Michael Musitano when he volleyed
a Paul Dee cross over the bar, Tony Lemezina a minute later from a Musitano cross that had
to be cleanly saved by Bob Catlin in the Marconi goal, another Lemezina chance that saw
Luke Casserly slip and fall to allow Tony to turn and shoot but was able to recover in time
to deflect the shot for a corner. Near the end of the half a corner went to the far post
where Marko Perinovic pushed the ball out for Dee to take a shot through the pack. Lachlan
Armstrong, the hero from Wednesday night's game against Olympic, deflected this just wide of the
far post. Finally to close the half a Dee cross was pushed on by Musitano only for Lemezina
to head over the bar.
The second half commenced with Marconi going out to show that the last 20 odd minutes were only an
abberation. They put on enormous pressure. Two minutes in Brad Maloney saw his shot slide just
outside the post. A few minutes later Maloney had another chance when a Mathew Bingley cross
came to him, but unfortunately it suffered the same fate as his previous shot. John Koch had to
save the day by heading over a rather dangerous Harper cross and then a minute later Brendan
Renaud headed over from a Bingley cross. Finally the pressure came to fruition when Bingley
crossed to Zoric. Vlado brought the ball down, beat Paul Dee and sent the ball under Giannasca
to give the home side a 2-0 lead.
On came Alex Castro for Marko Perinovic and the game started to change face. Canberra coach
Mike Lyons decided that the backs should just mark man-to-man and hence sent up 3 of the
original backs including sweeper Koch to attack continuously. Schaeffer countered this by
pulling Bingley back to a defender role. Within a few minutes there was action. Musitano
had a shot blocked by Aaron Holst after Castro fed him the ball, then Castro himself saw
his shot go accross goal when he was fed by Lemezina.
Then came the break through. A long cross came in and Catlin tried to punch this away to
safety. His punch unfortunately fell to Peter Mazis, who had moved forward. Mazis brought
the ball down and shot through the crowded penalty area and into the goal. The visitors
had brought the game to life and more was to follow. Both Musitano and Castro had good chances
in the next few minutes, but they went either wide of straight to Catlin.
Because the Cosmos were playing only two at back, they were open to the counter-attack. This
happened twice, but those two left back were equal to the task. Toplica Popovich put in
an excellent tackle to win the ball from a charging Bingley. Then Marconi had the chance to
put the game away when a Bingley cross was met sweetly by Brad Maloney for a volley. Giannasca
pulled off an immaculate save and the visitors were still in it.
The pressure kept on the Marconi goal and an attempted clearance near the right hand corner
found Norman Kelly who stuck his leg out and volleyed the ball into the middle. It fell in front
off Lemezina who pushed it a few metres wide to a waiting Musitano. Although on his left foot,
Michael drilled the ball past Catlin for the well deserved equalizer. A few minutes from the
end John Koch had a chance to score and help the visitors take all three points, but his shot
went straight at Catlin.
So the Cosmos finish the death duo of games (Olympic then Marconi) with two draws and both
of these could have been wins. Even though the Cosmos will not make the finals with only 5 games
left they will still do well and there's much promise for the next season. A note here is that
Marconi was the second last team to have previously have a 100% record against the Cosmos,
Olympic were the previous one. The only team left is Brisbane and Canberra plays them on
Easter Monday and in Brisbane. This will not be easy, but it can be done.