Match report - Round 2 Melbourne Victory v Brisbane Roar

On the 10th day of Christmas the dub gave to us - a hastily rearranged home match against Brisbane Roar. 293 days after our last match our girls in blue were finally back in action. This match was only announced just over 72 hours prior to kickoff as our original fixture, away to Perth Glory, was postponed due to a virus named after a really shit beer. The match also brought us a first ever home game played at CB Smith reserve in Fawkner.

Pre-match started early for the Vikings with a quick scoping trip to the ground to work out where we’d setup before heading to the pub for some pre-match nerves settling and talk about the season ahead. Would this be the year when we add a 2nd championship and regain control of Melbourne or would the team choose pain again. It also allowed us to watch the first half of Canberra v Melbourne City (our opponents in round 3) in case Jeff needed our help with the scouting report.

In a serendipitous moment, just as we started setting up inside the ground the team came out to do their warmup. We decided to take this as a sign from the footballing gods that we were the most favoured of all the teams in the land. We also discovered that the (in)famous Epping Stadium wind had relocated to Fawkner so we knew that was going to make for difficult playing conditions. And then came the most exciting news of the day so far - Mindy was back!!!

The match started with Brisbane attacking the Vikings end with the breeze at their backs but we weren’t worried as we had captain fantastic Angela Beard marshalling our defence. As was to be expected as they had already played a match Brisbane started strongly but couldn’t find a way past the magnificent back three of Angela Beard, Kayla Ann Morrison and Claudia Bunge. And on the odd occasion they did, well the magnificent Gabby Garton was there to do the mopping up. Then in the 28th minute came absolute disaster with Natalie Tatham being stretched off the ground with what appeared to be the dreaded ACL injury, replaced by Amy Jackson. The 1st half seemed to be drifting to a close but then on 44 minutes we broke forward with a lighting counter attack that saw a Kyra Cooney Cross shot from 20 yards fly just wide (which made us briefly wonder “Is Kyra out of touch?” before quickly realising as a certain principal from Springfield had before us “no it’s the ball that is wrong”. And with that the first half ended all square at 0-0.

The 2nd half saw Victory attacking the Vikings end and Lisa De Vanna was straight out of the blocks with a powerful run into the box that saw us earn a corner. Not long after Melina Ayres (aka Rocket Woman) almost got onto the end of a great cross but just couldn’t quite connect. No matter we were looking really dangerous now, with Kyra Cooney-Cross looking imperious in midfield. Speaking of Kyra, not long afterwards saw her float in a brilliant free kick that only narrowly missed. Not long afterwards came a magnificent chance for Lisa De Vanna but perhaps not realising she had more time than she realised she skied the ball over the bar (or perhaps she just wanted to take out the ambulance behind the goal, who are we to question Lisa). Sensing that a goal was close (and that the Brisbane players were intimidated by 4 very fearsome Vikings standing behind the goal) we ramped up our chanting and it had the desired effect with De Vanna having a magnificent shot on target but for some inexplicable reason was deemed offside. Despite our best efforts our request for VAR to review this fell on deaf ears. Cue some more attacking and a magnificent inswinging corner from Kyra that had all the hallmarks of Christine Nairn’s Olympico 2 years ago but was punched away at the last second by Georgina Worth in Brisbane’s goal.

And then came a moment when our hearts were in our mouths and we had that horrible sinking feeling in the pit of our stomach - Emily Gielnik was bearing down on goal with only Gabby Garton to beat. Time slowed down, we yelled out ‘Noooooooooo’ like they do in slow motion in the movies, Gielnik fired her shot low, the ball heading inexorably towards the back of the net and then - SAVE!!!!!!!! Gabby Garton channels her inner Casey Dumont and makes a brilliant fingertip save to push the ball over the crossbar and out for a corner. Not long after saw one of the chances of the match fall to Annalie Longo, after a peach of a pass from Angela Beard, but unfortunately she could only shoot over. By this point we were battering the Brisbane goal and the ball fell invitingly to Amy Jackson. At this point the wind decided it was a Roar fan and thus made it impossible for Amy to control the ball and get a shot off. Apart from a late goalmouth scramble in the Roar box that was it, the spoils shared. All in all a satisfactory performance and result considering Brisbane, along with Sydney FC, were widely tipped as the team to beat this season.

Some things we learnt out of this match:

• Lisa De Vanna looks primed for a big season

• Garton is confident between the sticks

• Morrison is gonna be solid in defence

• Kyra Konney Cross is gonna be leading assists

• Angela Beard is improving year on year

Next up the derby against Melbourne City.