– Gavin Staindl
DANDENONG Thunder has gone down 2-1 to Green Gully and matters look set to get worse for the Premier League club.
Dandenong was bumped back to seventh position after the away loss to the Cavaliers and will need to win at least two of the next three games to qualify for finals.
But its cause will not be helped by the departures of Jeff Bright and Geoff Kellaway.
Bright has returned to Perth for personal reasons while Kellaway has signed a deal with Melbourne Victory to begin playing for the A-League team this month.
Dandenong will also play out the three remaining regular season games over eight days.
The Thunder is scheduled to play Sunshine and Heidelberg over the coming two weekends but has also been ordered by Football Federation Victoria to play the catch-up match against Northcote as a mid-week rubber on Wednesday.
This will stretch a playing list already coming to grips with player departures.
Both Bright and Kellaway missed Saturday’s game against Green Gully, and despite Kellaway’s replacement, Denis Ukalovski, scoring the game’s first goal, the pair’s absence was felt.
“They are two of our best players, Jeff Bright at full back has been wonderful in defence even during the early games when we were losing,” Thunder coach Stuart Munro said.
And it was in defence that the visitors fell down.
“We were hanging onto our lead and we were too deep and sitting back … we did not play too well defensively.
“We’ve just been sloppy in defence over the past two weeks and it will need working on,” Munro added.
.
