Ozbey double ignites Olympic’s Premiership chances

Matthew Mayora fired the opening shot with a wayward left-footed effort in the 5? minute as his man-marker in Joel Grenell dropped off before Paul Wither sent his header wide a couple of minutes later from a delightful cross from Adam Biddle.
Ozbey showed in the 8? minute with a teasing run and shot that Brad Swancott in goal, handled well as Olympic  announced they were at home and wanted all the points.
Spencer Prior went forward for a corner and found the ball at his feet in the 15^? minute but his powerfully struck shot, although on target from all of 6-yards out, was well blocked.
The visitors did take the lead a minute later when Blues goalkeeper Sam Emmanuoil dropped a centred free-kick for Joe Gibbs to stab home and send Manly United ahead.
Matthew Bingley received a caution for bringing down an Olympic striker but nothing materialised from the resulting free-kick as Manly cleared their lines and set up another raid down the right-flank.
Sydney Olympic came close again when Ozbey went down the right and centred for Peter McPherson to fire in a shot that sadly for the home side saw a deflection off Paul Wither and the ball finished wide. 
Mayora should have done better when picking up the ball in the 35? minute and showing Prior a  clean set of heels as he sliced through the Manly defence with ease before sending in an effort with the outside of his right boot that curled agonisingly wide of the ?keepers right-hand upright. 
In first-half stoppage time Manly United had to substitute the injured Joel Grenell with Scott Thomas and Olympic had to change Adam Biddle and replace him with Ken Chun as injury reared its ugly head in what had been a very fair and free flowing contest. 
Manly United FC opened the second period with a centred cross from Josh Sama that eluded everyone, including the goalkeeper who was lucky to see the ball barely graze the post as it slipped out for a goal-kick.
Andrew Mailer became the second United player into referee Peter Vrtkovski?s book. The referee incidentally had an outstanding game. 
Ozbey came more and more into the game and in the 55? minute had Swancott scrambling full length down to his left to stop a goal bound effort as Olympic must have been wondering where their goal was coming from as they peppered the Manly rearguard with neat inter-changing and surging runs down both flanks.
Fabio Alves Pena put over a cross from the right which fell to Sama but his eventual effort went wide of the mark as Manly took the game to the home side as their impetus began to flag with the enforced changes, although Mayora should have levelled the scores when Ramsay found him unmarked in the box but he toe-poked it over the bar much to the chagrin of the home support.
However that changed when Tolgay Ozbey rippled the net on 72? minutes after a clean break from the back to equalize. Justice finally prevailed for the Blues following their attacking efforts but the end product had been quite woeful to this point with too many chances squandered.
Moments later, Ozbey had an effort cleared off the line, this time by Prior before his follow-up effort found the net but was disallowed for an infringement on the Manly goalkeeper.
Ozbey did eventually find the net once again as Olympic took the lead on 85? minutes with a right-foot shot that squirmed under Swancott.
Ozbey nearly completed his hat-trick when put through by Daniel Taylor but this time the trusty left-foot was found wanting as the ball went across the goal mouth and away.
It was somewhat of a Jeckyl and Hyde performance by Olympic but they eventually ground out the result against a depleted Manly United on the night.
Manly coach Phil Moss said afterwards:
?We made two mistakes at the back this evening and let in two goals but I am proud of the effort my lads showed tonight. 
?I had two players pull out at 4pm this afternoon which didn?t help in the build up to the game but that is not an excuse. 
?We were missing several key players tonight Groves, Midgley, Cattanach etc) and we showed some good form at times during the game.
 ?Our defence has been solid all season but we really need to finish off the chances we are making in games.?
Blues boss Nick Theodorakopoulos stated:
?It was a game of two halves really, we started brightly but fell away a bit during the match but in saying that we were unlucky to only win 2-1 tonight. 
?In saying that, I would rather win a match by that score and create a dozen chances than not have created them at all and we go to Sydney United next in good spirit.?
In the earlier match Manly United defeated Sydney Olympic by the only goal.
Match Stats
Sydney Olympic 2 (Tolgay Ozbey 72?, 85)
Manly United 1 (Joe Gibbs 16?)
Belmore Sports Ground, Belmore
Referee: Peter Vrtkovski
Assistant Referees: Murray Wilson and Paul Faithful
Fourth Official: Brendan Johansson
Sydney Olympic: 20.Sam Emmanouil; 4.Mirko Jurilj, 5.Michael Cindric, 6.Emmanuel Giannaros, 22.Peter Zorbas (14.Chris Triantis 58?), 7.Peter McPherson, 18.Adam Biddle (19.Ken Chun 42?), 17.Iain Ramsay, 11.Tolgay Ozbey, 8.Paul Wither, 15.Matthew Mayora (23.Chris Cahill 84?)
Substitutes Not Used: 21.Nestor Tsioustas, 2.Bobby Dragas
Yellow Cards: Nil
Red Cards: Nil
Manly United FC: 1.Brad Swancott; 3.Andrew Mailer, 4.Spencer Prior, 5.Joel Grenell (6.Scott Thomas 45?), 16.Joey Schirripa, 15.Keith Shevlin, 20.Matt Bingley, 8.Michael Lloyd-Green, 23.Fabio Alves Pena (19.Jamie Garside 82?), 10.Josh Sama, 33.Joe Gibbs
Substitutes Not Used: 17.Scott Wright, 24.Jimmy Oates, 40.Rhyss Keane
Yellow Cards: Matthew Bingley 20?, Andrew Mailer 48?
Red Cards: Nil
Player Ratings:
3 ? Tolgay Ozbey (SO)
2 ? Joe Gibbs (MUFC)
1 ? Iain Ramsay (SO)
-By Micky Brock