FLAME HOLD ON FOR GUTSY WIN AGAINST HURSTVILLE
South Coast Flame returned to the winner’s circle on Saturday evening after a gutsy 2-1 win over Hurstville Zagreb FC. A first-half double to Hiroaki Ushijima was enough for the Flame, as a second-half goal to Dario Borovickic was not enough for the visitors to mount a comeback. South Coast move up to third position on the ladder, as Hurstville slip to fourth.
South Coast opened the scoring in the 10th minute, as Ushijima was able to latch onto a long ball and place it into the back of the net – leaving Matthew Massarotto no chance of saving the shot.
Hurstville were up for a challenge and threatened the Flame’s goal in the 24th minute – when David Pavey was able to feed a nice ball into the path of Jesse Gagro, whose shot was easily saved by Matthew White.
The game looked to have settled into a rhythm after this passage of play, as South Coast looked to overcome the physicality of an imposing Hurstville outfit.
South Coast had their second goal of the match in the 32nd minute, as a massive blunder from Massaratto lead to the ball falling straight into the path of Ushijima – who made no mistake of scoring and had his second goal of the match.
Johnny Vicoroski was able to latch onto a through-ball from Matthew Mazevski in the 39th minute, but his strike that followed just missed the left post.
Jayden Smileski looked to burst forward down the Flames left-wing through his marauding runs from left-fullback, as he threatened the right-edge of Hurstville.
Both Jesse and Paul Gagro looked to threaten the Flame’s defense following this, however could not create a clear chance – and at times looked out of rhythm in the Hurstville attack. Hurstville looked very disorganised in the first-half and needed to correct this issue before the beginning of the second-half.
Hurstville came out of the sheds with a renewed sense of intent, and very nearly grabbed their first goal of the match in the 46th minute – as Adrian Livio fired a thunderous shot which hit the post.
Paul Gagro was able to feed the ball to Sebastian Coello in the 54th minute, leading to Coello hitting an ambitious volley which only just sailed over the bar.
Hurstville were rewarded for their efforts in the 67th minute as Borovickic clawed a goal back for the visitors. Borovickic’s deflected shot sent White the wrong way and ended up in the back of the net.
Mazevski looked to put the game to bed soon after, as he hit a thunderous free kick which collided with the bar. Andrew Christie was ruled to have impeded Massarotto in the follow-up.
Daniel Cocina was able to connect with a ball across the Flame’s goal in the 73rd minute, but he connected with the cross poorly and his shot sailed over the bar.
Hurstville couldn’t penetrate the Flame’s defence in the final 20 minutes and were only able to create half-chances which didn’t bother South Coast’s defence to a great extent. The Flame were able to respond to their 4-0 loss last week with a gutsy 2-1 victory.
South Coast are on the road against Western Condors next Saturday, in what is their first of five-straight away matches. First Grade kick off is 5:30pm.
Our U/18’s and U/20’s both had comfortable wins in the earlier matches against a very poor Hurstville outfit. The U/18’s won 3-1 in the earliest game whilst the U/20’s comfortably accounted for Hurstville in a 3-0 win. The U/18’s currently sit 7th on the ladder whilst the U/20’s sit in 8th position.