Doka Penalty Wins It For Mariners

The Wanderers run of Sunday games continued in Gosford as they took on the 2nd placed Central Coast Mariners looking for a win to push them back into the top 2 picture, and once again the referee took centre stage, missing a blatant red card offence for the Mariners Jacob Farrell, and then awarding a soft penalty to hand the Mariners a 1-0 win at home.

Dealing with a raft of injuries & suspensions resulted in Dylan Scicluna making his first start for the Wanderers in place of Aidan Simmons & Tate Russell while Oscar Priestman took the place of Jorrit Hendrix in the midfield. Neither new signing Sonny Kittel or Brandon Borrello were deemed to be match fit enough to return to the starting 11 but Daniel Margush came back to start in goal with Taiga Harper on the bench following his win in the Wanderers NPL team the night before.

The abysmal pitch was a minefield early on, players constantly losing their footing as the turf cut up any time they tried to change speed or direction. Both teams were having trouble building attacks in the first 10 minutes. The Wanderers put together an attack with Alex Badolato threading a ball to Antonsson, the striker found Lachie Brook with a backheel for his under-lapping run, the shot blocked by the Mariners fullback and out for a corner that Brillante kicked over the goal-line, potentially letting the Mariners off the hook for Farrell's illegal rugby tackle on Marcelo.

Milanovic almost pulled out a wonder strike in the 20th minute, he lined up from 25 yards out and hammered the ball back off the crossbar via a save by Danny Vukvoic. It rebounded fortuitously to the Mariners and they went route one, releasing Jing Reec with Marcelo trailing back and unable to do much to impact the shot. Margush had raced out to meet the striker and Reec's attempted chip hit Margush in the face and bounced away. Gabriel Cleur had a pop from 30 yards out in the 28th minute and unsurprisingly for a player with just a single goal as a professional, it went wide.

In the 30th minute the Wanderers complaints about officiating bias were proven yet again. Marcus Antonsson was free down the right flank until Jacob Farrell came in from the side with a horrendous leaping studs up challenge that missed the ball completely and smashed Antonsson in the foot. It was the type of foul that Hendrix was sent off and suspended for just last week, and far worse than the tackles Simmons and Beadling both got three week bans for. The replays weren't any better. I don't understand how the central referee, the linesmen or the 4th official all missed it being a studs up lunge making contact with the ankle, and even if you accept the incompetence of the A-League officials, then where was the VAR? How could that possibly be not a clear and obvious error? It was another example of the bias against the Wanderers.

Antonsson was forced off with an injury due to the tackle, just like Brandon Borrello was when he was ruled out for 3 months when Brattan broke his foot. There VAR didn't bother to intervene after the referee called the Wanderers to play on immediately, and here the VAR was conspicuously absent. The last time an opponent got away with a clear straight red the excuse from the head of referees was that it didn't involve studs, so I'm wondering what excuse they'll come up with now. Borrello took his place in a small manner of irony, with Antonsson in a moon boot and going to have to get scans done to look for a broken ankle or foot. 

The rest of the half proceeded with few chances, one for the Mariners hitting off the posts and being cleared away, leaving the teams heading into the break at 0-0.

On the hour mark Farrell should have exited the pitch once and for all. He committed a dangerous, reckless challenge in midfield that should have seen the game immediately stopped for what would have been his second yellow card. Instead of the yellow & red, instead the Wanderers got an "advantage" that under recent changes in the laws of the game, gave the ref an excuse to avoid handing out the 2nd yellow. Shortly after Jean-Paul de Marigny, the Wanderers substitute head coach, threw on Dylan Pierias and Sonny Kittel in a double switch for Badolato and Nicolas Milanovic.

The Wanderers defence had a moment of panic in the 68th minute, Ryan Edmondson running onto a lobbed through ball that Margush ran out of his goal to clear, but not cleanly enough to stop Edmondson having a chance to fire a back to goal kick over his head toward goal. It lacked power and direction and didn't ultimately threaten the Wanderers goal. Brook came off along with Priestman, both suffering from knocks after some heavy treatment from the Mariners. Milos Ninkovic made his entrance for the first time in a month, with Aydan Hammond making just his second career appearance along with him.

Edmondson had another chance from a right wing cross, but he either misjudged the cross or perhaps it was too high in the air for him to make any contact with it. Josh Brillante went down in the 78th minute with a piece of friendly fire as Scicluna's elbow met his throat while both were jumping for a challenge.

Referee Daniel Elder had been the Mariners best player all evening long, and in the 82nd minute he sent them to the spot to open the scoring in favour of the home side. Gabriel was in the process of clearing a cut-back when a Mariners player dived over his foot, winning a butter soft penalty that was converted by Mikael Doka sending Margush the wrong way to make it 1-0. The Mariners managed to waste enough time to hold onto to their slim lead and take three points.

The Wanderers next match is against Adelaide United, in Adelaide on Saturday the 24th of February with kick-off at 7:45pm.