Perth Glory were brought back to earth tonight in front of a paltry crowd of just 7921 on a perfect night for football. In what was described by coach Steve McMahon as a very disappointing performance a single headed goal by Jets new signing Vaughan Coveny after 47 minutes decided this game.
Glory started with the same line-up as last week, with once again McMahon Junior and Coyne both played out of position. Where this worked in the previous week against Sydney, tonight was a dismal failure. Coyne looked completely out of place on the left and McMahon just appeared lost in space for most of the match.
It was a game of few clear cut chances and indeed one of the best came after 11 minutes, when Despotovski hit the base of the Jets goalpost after a shot from just outside the box. Sekulovski fastened on the rebound but his shot was easily saved by Reddy. In the 14th minute Milicic was on the end of a good ball from Kohler but as he turned to shoot he was well closed down by Horsley who cleared.
Just 4 minutes later Mori tried to burst through between 2 Jets defenders but was failed to get a shot at goal as Zelic and Picken closed him down.
In the 22nd minute Horsley came close to his first goal of the season, unfortunately for him though it was at the wrong end of the ground as his attempted back header was wide of Petkovic who managed to scramble back and turn the ball around the post for an ineffective corner to the Jets.
From that moment to the 40th minute it was a real dire midfield struggle with Celeski trying his best for Perth but the Jets central defender totally covering the Glory strike force. However in the 40th minute local favourite Horsley went on a 50 metre run through the heart of the Jets defence but his attempted square ball to Mori was blocked back to Reddy.
Just 1 minute later a great ball from Despotovski found Reddy stranded on the edge of his area and Mori lobbing the keeper, but unfortunately for the veteran striker the ball was too high and long and went harmlessly wide.
The 2nd half was just 2 minutes old when the vital strike happened. It came from a fine North cross that found the unmarked Coveny completely free on the 6 yard line to easily head past Petkovic.
How Coveny was left unmarked is a mystery however questions must be asked of his marker McMahon who appeared to move away from the player instead of attacking him.
In the 58th minute McMahon Snr made a double substitution with Caceres and Ishida replacing Sekulovski and Celeski. Again a strange decision by a coach whose tactical skills must now be questioned.
While it added some width to the attack it was in essence a straight swap and did nothing to really change the formation or structure of the game.
That Glory had failed for the first hour with this formation begged the question as to why a fundamental change by the coach did not occur. Maybe the exchange of one of the out of sorts full backs for a more attacking player could have brought a better result.
As it was chances for the rest of the match were few and far between. A Caceres shot after 69 minutes was just wide of the goal,a along range effort from ward was too high and in injury time it was Caceres again having a great shot just wide. Just a minute before the last Caceres shot, Glory should have had a penalty when Richard Johnson handled the ball 2 metres inside the box, but the referee Simon Przydacz gave the free kick some 7 metres outside the box, a strange decision indeed.
So Newcastle's fantastic run of form continued as the picked up their 17th point out of a possible 21 and extended their unbeaten run to 7 matches.
For Glory it is back to the drawing board and really the question has to be asked if the coach has either the skill or the players to get things back on track.
Just what the team will do once Matt Horsley retires after next week's match against the Central Coast just does not bear thinking about, especially when the squad has basically been reduced to just 17 players, with Stuart Young and Daniel Vasilevski totally off side with the coach.