Rainy weather masks Tigers tears at Lambert Park
The Wolves mastered the conditions quicker and looked the more eager for the result, even though Nick Littler was seeing stars after a clash of heads with Mark Byrnes that required treatment leaving Wolves down to ten-men before the left-sided defender returned with a head swathed in bandages.
A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt were distinctly lethargic at times although they rode the early pressure more through the lack of a quality final ball, or poor finishing, than their own hard work as they looked out of sorts and totally unlike the side who managed a draw against Bonnyrigg in the last round.
The Tigers did get themselves going late in the first-half courtesy of the combination of Chris James, Nick Rizzo and David D?Apuzzo whom started to shine. However, by this time, the Tigers were two goals down when firstly Sasho Petrovski was able to beat the offside trap and latch onto a beautiful through ball from Lawrence Drake. The A-League veteran left the Tigers defenders standing with their hands in the air awaiting a whistle, though Petrovski calmly strode through and found the net to put his side ahead, before Chris Nathaniel made it 2-0 when he latched onto a Mark Picciolini pass to slot home with aplomb in the 41? minute.
It was now that A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt upped their game and finally came to grips with the surface and conditions, and perhaps could have halved the deficit before the break when Michael West looped over a cross that Younis was just unable to gain enough purchase on with his head seconds before the half-time whistle.
The only good news for the A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt supporters to this point was that the rain stopped for the entire duration of the break and immediately started again when the players reappeared, though it was a different Tigers who took the field for the second 45? minutes.
James, who had been prompting, probing and always looking for the ball during the opening half, became ever more involved as the Tigers got their style of football going and slowly began to push the Wolves back into defending very deep but it allowed gaps at the back with only Cole Tinkler and John Kelso operating the defensive duties.
The Tigers defence were on several occasions almost caught out but managed to maintain the status quo and were back in the match when Nick Littler was adjudged to have brought down substitute Sam Messam inside the penalty-area in the 83? minute. James stepped up and confidently slotted home the penalty to make for an exciting finish.
A side is never more vulnerable than when they?ve just scored and the Wolves put this to use when Cameron Littler fired in a long-range effort through a sea of bodies to restore their two goal lead.
Another side may have given up the ghost but A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt pressed harder and it was James, in a man of the match performance, who was clean through on goal, but in the wet and slippery conditions managed to skew the ball over the crossbar from just inside the box.
James was in the thick of the action in injury time when he sent over a cross for another substitute, Anthony Hartshorn, to head home the final goal of the game to make it 2-3, though the visiting Wolves administered the remaining minutes to secure a very important three-points from Leichhardt.
A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt?s Grade-20 coach Rod Williams commented following the match:
?I thought South Coast compressed the game and played very well in the first-half and we were never allowed to get our passing game going in the middle third, or the back third for that matter, but we did manage three one-on-one?s that would have for a different story.
?Chris James has an excellent game but the real thing is that Wolves throttled our passing game early on and stymied our style of play, but the second-half we got to grips and I think we were unlucky not to get a point out of it at least.
?I told the guys at half-time we didn?t show up in the first 45? minutes and we needed to step it up and we could have gone on to get at least a point but South Coast played very well and all credit to them, they are not an easy team to play and they held on well.?
South Coast Wolves coach Trevor Morgan was modest in his appraisal when stating:
?We said last year our aim was just to turn the club around and get a style of play that was respected by people but this year we kind of figured that unless we start beating sides it?s not really respect and just nice football we?re playing.
?I watched A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt last week against Bonnyrigg and they were very good in a quality game so I had a bit of a plan in mind for today about how we might be able to contain their key players and we set about that and as we started to gain a little bit of control in the game we had Sash (Petrovski) get us a goal that often last year was missing.
?It was a very skiddy surface and both sides had chances to maybe capitalise on chances from through balls that might have gripped on any other day but that?s how they managed to get the penalty with a skiddy ball slipped in behind the defence.
?We had a fair few chances ourselves and we certainly never had any intention of sitting back and hitting on the counter.
?We knew they would have received a rev up at the break so we were concentrating on keeping it tight for the first 15? minutes or so of the second-half as we knew we would be facing a bit of an onslaught, so if we could hold that period out we could then try and build towards a strong finish.
?I?m very happy with the win because A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt are no easy team to beat, particularly here, as they are a top side and I think a lot of sides underestimated them last year, but to get the win today is like gold dust to us.
The Tigers-Wolves Grade-20 match finished in better fashion for the home side as they defeated the visitors 3-0 in a tough contest.
Match Stats
A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt Tigers 2 (James 85? (Pen), Hartshorn 90?+2?)
South Coast Wolves 3 (Petrovski 22?, Nathaniel 41?, C. Littler 86?)
Sunday 10th April, 2011
Lambert Park, Leichhardt
Referee: James Lewis
Assistant Referees: Adam Coombes and Thomas Lee
Fourth Official: Matthew Samson
A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt Tigers: 1.Jose Bello-Amigo; 2.Mark Byrnes, 3.John Kelso, 4.Cole Tinkler, 5.Michael West, 7.Stephen Kayes, 9.Robbie Younis (14.Sam Messam 66?), 10.Franco Parisi (C) (17.Matt Fsadni 70?), 11.Nick Rizzo (8.Anthony Hartshorn 63?), 13.David D?Apuzzo, 23.Chris James
Substitutes Not Used: 15.David Dascal, 22.Terry Dalbroi
Yellow Cards: D?Apuzzo 24, James 38
Red Cards: Nil
South Coast Wolves: 1.Brody Crane (C); 2.Alex Mansueto, 3.David Abel, 4.JacobTimpano, 5.Nick Littler, 6.Lawrence Drake (14.Cameron Littler 63?), 8.Andres Gomez (17.David Stojic 77?), 9.Mark Picciolini, 10.Sasho Petrovski (12.Jack Keating 87?), 11.Chris Nathaniel, 13.Stjepan Paric
Substitutes Not Used: 19.Peter Simonovski, 20.Hayden Durose
Yellow Cards: Abel 66?
Red Cards: Nil
Player Ratings:
3 ? Chris James (ALT)
2 ? Lawrence Drake (SCW)
1 ? David D?Apuzzo (ALT)
-By Micky Brock
