Sydney FC made the short trip up to Newcastle on Saturday night, coming away with a narrow 1-0 victory in a tight contest.
The match played out much like Sydney’s game against Melbourne City last week. In this game, there was a noticeable improvement in Sydney’s movement and tempo. However, in the early parts of the game it was quite obvious that Newcastle would be no pushover.
While some of the post-game analysis pointed out how dull the game was, the match was quite entertaining in the flesh. The first half was quite good without there being any clear-cut opportunities for either side.
As has become the norm, Sydney quickly gained control of possession. The passes for the Sky Blues were flowing and they were able to traverse the pitch from one flank to the other with little difficulty.
Defensively, there was visible improvement in Sydney’s back four. Jacques Faty and Matt Jurman seemed to communicate better, while Seb Ryall and Rhyan Grant were also impressive on the flanks. There were fewer errors among them. However Newcastle’s Milos Trifunovic did prove to be a handful throughout the encounter.
There was a lovely gesture from the Squadron in the 23d minute, with a minute’s applause commemorating the loss of one of their own. The Cove also joined in singing ‘Rhythm of my Heart,’ their song commemorating the loss of their own with the Squadron.
Newcastle did open the scoring in the 36th minute via Jason Hoffman. Luckily for the Sky Blues, his effort was ruled out for offside. There were groans from the Jets fans as the replay on the big screen indicated that Hoffman was onside.
From there, the excitement was contained to a midfield battle right until half time. Newcastle were happy to hit on the counter but most of their opportunities were nothing to write home about.
Sydney FC came out in the second half and lifted the tempo. Very quickly, the game opened up. Chances began appearing and the second half seemed to travel extremely quickly.
Late in the game, Sydney had a great chance through the boot of Shane Smeltz. Smeltz, while working hard throughout game, looks to be out of touch with the boot. He went one-on-one with the Jets goalkeeper and in an attempt to chip the ball over him, chipped the ball over the crossbar.
With the match headed towards a draw, it looked like Smeltz’s earlier opportunity would come back to haunt the Sky Blues. But with a minute remaining of normal time, Sydney had earned a corner.
Substitute Alex Gersbach came across to take it. He whipped in a low delivery to the near post and Alex Brosque connected with his head to send the ball into the goal. It was 1-0 to Sydney and the game finished minutes later.
While it was all well and good to get the points on the day for Sydney, what would have been clear to anyone watching the game was that Sydney currently lacks a genuine goalscoring threat.
Much of the offseason was spent by Sydney fans deliberating the impact of Marc Janko’s departure. While Arnold certainly provided his reasons for not re-signing the Austrian, at this point it looks as though the loss of Janko is significant.
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While both Brosque and Smeltz worked hard, along with Chris Naumoff, there was little in the way of an actual goal threat. As was the case last week, the majority of Sky Blue attempts on goal were straight at the goalkeeper.
Milos Ninkovic seems to be unable to shoot, while Milos Dimitrijevic seems to be still settling into his slightly altered role and as a consequence, shooting does not seem to be on his radar.
With the Sydney Derby in a few days time, it is an important aspect of Arnold’s tactics to look at. What we have seen in recent derbies is at least two goals per game. With Arnold wanting to play with an interchanging front three, it is important for the pillars of the front three to find their goalscoring touch quickly.
For the moment, it is a positive that the game against the Jets saw an improvement for the Sky Blues. But if the goals do not come soon, it could be a frustrating season.
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