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11Jan20
Streak Continues As Wellington Edge Wests
by Jeremy Ruane
Wellington Phoenix equalled their club record of nine games without defeat at Sky Stadium on 11 January, easing past Western Sydney Wanderers 2-0 in front of 9166 fans to consolidate their top four position in the Hyundai A-League.
There was more action in the first fifteen minutes of this contest than there was in the balance of the match - it was a terrific opening stanza in which both teams fully played their part.
Wellington were first to threaten, Callum McCowatt roaming down the left in the second minute before playing in the overlapping Liberato Cacace, whose cross was headed out to McCowatt. He let rip with a thumping fifteen yard volley which sizzled past the near post of the diving Daniel Lopar.
Wests retorted three minutes later, Nicolai Muller - central to all that was good about the visitors' play - threading a pass through for Mohamed Adam to latch onto and take around the approaching figure of Stefan Marinovic. But the covering challenge of Cacace left the striker on the deck, and Wests appealing in vain for a penalty.
Back came Wellington, a concerted spell of pressure which began with Matti Steinmann's pass wide to Tim Payne. The fullback's cross picked out Ulises Davila, whose volley was blocked by the legs of Dylan McGowan.
When next on the ball, in the tenth minute, Payne pinged a cross-field pass to his fellow fullback Cacace, who swiftly stormed forward down the left flank before delivering a searching cross tailor-made for the fast-arriving Gary Hooper to turn home.
Much to Wests' relief, Matt Jurman's tracking run allowed him to intervene and avert the danger - for now. Because Wellington kept on coming. Mere seconds later, Davila and Hooper worked an opening in the visitors' half of the pitch which culminated in the Mexican unleashing a twenty yard missile which crashed against the base of Lopar's left-hand upright.
McCowatt latched onto the rebound and sent a cross careering across the face of goal, but no one in yellow was racing in to turn the ball home, much to Wests' relief, as it gave them the chance to launch a thirteenth minute counter-attack.
Muller and Mitchell Duke combined, the latter setting up Pirmin Schwegler for a curling effort which took a deflection off Luke DeVere and arced over the flailing fingertips of Marinovic and just past the angle of post and crossbar.
Once more Wellington responded, and this time they hit pay dirt! Jaushua Sotirio picked out Hooper with a pass which allowed the targetman to hold the ball up well before slipping an inch-perfect lay-off into the stride of Davila.
The home team's leading marksman took one touch to control the ball before lashing a twenty-five yard grasscutter beyond the diving figure of Lopar and
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into the bottom far corner of the net to the undisguised delight of the local faithful - 1-0 Wellington.
Crazily, that goal changed the entire nature of the match, with Wests rocked by the strike, while Wellington were quite content to sit on their lead and invite their opponents to try to find a way through their rivals' ranks.
Wests mustered two chances in the remainder of the half, but only after a superb tackle by McGowan on the half-hour denied McCowatt as he looked to engineer an opening on the edge of the area.
The visitors responded through Daniel Georgievski, whose drive was blocked to safety by Payne before Muller and Duke wove their wizardry once more, the latter letting rip with a twenty yard which flew narrowly past Marinovic's left-hand post eight minutes before half-time.
When Wests next threatened, the game had past the hour mark, and substitute Nick Sullivan had entered the fray. With his first touches of the ball, he threatened to upset the order which had prevailed since Wellington's goal, only for Steven Taylor to block his shot and ensure that the home team's advantage would be maintained.
Muller fired a twenty-five yard missile soon afterwards which didn't miss by much, before, thirteen minutes from time, flicking the ball on to Kwame Yeboah, the striker inviting another substitute, Kostandinos Grozos, to let fly. He couldn't direct his effort on target.
Duke then thrashed a volley past the post after further Muller-inspired promptings ten minutes from time, but Wests were now getting desperate in the face of a Wellington defensive performance in which Taylor and DeVere were nigh on impeccable.
So, too, Cacace, who strengthened his claims to be man-of-the-match in the 83rd minute with a dazzling run down the left which left three opponents trailing in his wake before he teamed up with McCowatt.
Ben Waine was unable to make the most of the resulting cross, but when Cacace set off on another solo slalom two minutes from time, the fullback this time evaded all-comers before angling a shot past Lopar and into the net to wrap up Wellington's win, one which sees them match the nine-match unbeaten streak they recorded last season, the best in the club's history to date.
Wellington: Marinovic; Payne, Taylor, DeVere, Cacace; Sotirio (Sutton, 67), Devlin, Steinmann, McCowatt; Hooper (Waine, 79), Davila (Hudson-Wihongi, 90)
West. Sydney: Lopar; McGowan (booked, 73), Ziegler (booked, 86), Jurman; Russell, Schwegler (booked, 54) (Grozos, 61), Muller, Georgievski; Yeboah (Auglah, 84), Duke, Adam (Sullivan, 61)
Referee: Adam Kersey
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