Round 17 - Monash

The highly anticipated re-match today against Monash, this time at Wembley Park. Last time the 2 sides met it was a 2 nil win to Monash in difficult circumstances (see Round 8 report). The weather was kind to us and conditions were perfect for a game of football, even the ref turned up and he was older than 12 !

Monash got off to an attacking start, you could tell that they were determined by the way that they were moving on their toes even before the whistle had blown. In contrast our lads looked flat footed and not as switched on. Monash pressed us hard and they had some very good early chances, we were lucky not to have been down by 2 or 3 goals after the first 10 minutes. Then mid way through the 1st half Monash won a corner and the ball ping ponged it's way around the 6 yard box. We were lazy in defence and Monash took advantage by toe poking the ball through a sea of players legs to capture a sneaky yet effective conversion.

1 nil down and things were not looking good. Our lads were being beaten to every ball, we were missing out tragets when passing and generally we just looked ordinary compared to the opposition. Half time could not come quickly enough and when it did Stackie took the boys into the rooms.

The message was loud and clear..."Fire Up". Monash were playing us off the park and we needed to lift our work rate and get serious. Stackie challenged some individuals to put in a bigger effort and get involved in the game. He wanted the boys to walk out of the change rooms with a different attitude and take the game up to Monash. We only had 20 minutes left this year to show Monash what we can do and we needed to take every chance we had.

The message seemed to have got through and our intensity in the 2nd half was much better. We put more pressure on Monash and we started to win more of the ball in midfield. In fact in the first 10 minutes of the 2nd half we had 3 good chances to score, one in particular that the Monash Keeper only managed to stop on the line.

Monash also had a couple of good counter attacks and they were unlucky when Billy came off his line and was temporarily unsighted when one of our defenders blocked his view of the Monash striker. The shot went just wide of the post and out for a goal kick. Time was against us and Monash managed to clear the ball efeectively enough to keep us from levelling the score.

So a 1 nil loss to the league champions, congratulations must go to Monash for winning the league...well done. We need to win next week against South Yarra to hold on to 2nd spot on the ladder and depending on how well Bulleen go against Manningham today, we may have a close finish on goal difference.

One thing is for certain, next year the competiton will be much stronger and we have a lot of work to do between now and then to ensure that we remain competitive.