By Marcus Uhe
A moment of genius from an unlikely hero in Brad Plant may prove vital in Dandenong City’s quest to play finals in the National Premier League (NPL) Victoria this season, playing a key role in one of the upsets of the season against South Melbourne on Friday night.
In just his fifth appearance of the season, and having only been on the pitch for 15 minutes, Plant combined with his skipper Jack Webster to catch the South Melbourne defence unaware.
From a dead ball, as City players and their South Melbourne opponents gathered around the City penalty area, Plant darted through a gap in the defence at the perfect moment, as Webster slipped the ball into his path.
The pair were completely in-sync, one step ahead of everyone else on the pitch, and most importantly, the South Melbourne defenders.
Plant gathered the ball with his first touch, turned and fired for goal, and despite not striking it cleanly, there was enough behind the attempt to trickle over the goalline.
It’s a third goal in two matches for Plant, who bagged a brace for City against Hume City in last week’s loss.
The drama was not yet over, with City forced to survive an agonising five-and-a-half minutes of stoppage time and John Hall making another trademark goalline save, but City held on to shock the competition.
In doing so, City became just the second side in 2024 to take three points from both South Melbourne and the Oakleigh Cannons, and one of only three to get the better of South Melbourne at Lakeside Stadium.
South Melbourne would have sown-up the premiership with three games remaining should they have pocketed the win, but City was eager to spoil the party.
The home side fielded an understrength side, having played a Dockerty Cup semi-final against Hume City on Tuesday night.
The competition’s leading goalscorer in Harry Sawyer started on the bench, as did first-choice goalkeeper, Javier Lopez.
The best chance of the first half-hour fell to Vali Cesnik, who snuck into the box unguarded and was afforded a golden opportunity with the South Melbourne goalkeeper out of position having just made a save, but his right-footed strike hit the side netting.
Minutes later, his regret was eschewed, thanks to Damian Iaconis.
An alert Tom Bower made a lose ball his own in the middle of the pitch and drew a handful of defenders into his immediate quarters, allowing Kenny Athiu to slip past the final line of defence unmarked into the penalty area.
Bower’s pass intended for Athiu was wayward, but the closest South Melbourne defender unintentionally played the ball perfectly into stride for an opportunistic Iaconis on the opposite of the penalty area, who found the back of the net with his first-time strike on his right foot.
The goal shocked home fans, despite City holding its own on the possession front in the early stages, and brought the contest to life, forcing the competition’s pace-setters to come from behind.
City took the one-goal lead into the break, with South Melbourne making a trio of substitutions coming out of half time, including the injection of Sawyer.
Within just five minutes of action, he had leveled the scores, heading home from close range for his 15th goal of the campaign.
Sniffing blood, the ladders leaders were now making all the attacking and pressing hard on the visitors as they maintained possession in the back half, eager to seal top spot on the chilly Friday night.
Midway through the second half, however, City found an extra gear.
The resilience and fortitude that carried them into the top division this season and has seen them punch above their weight time and time again in 2024 was rising to the fore once again, and the prospect of an upset stirred like the gusty wind in Albert Park.
Tensions bubbled to the surface in the 80th minute with City’s support staff and assistant coaches enraged after Cesnik was fouled away from the ball in front of the City bench.
Nick Tolios’ assistants left their technical area to confront the referees and South Melbourne player who they believed fouled Cesnik off the ball, with the offending player shown a yellow card.
Cesnik and Will Bower made way for Tim Atherinos and Brady Quinn in the 85th minute, with Tolios looking to captalise on City’s extra legs by adding two attacking threats.
While it was not either of those two that found the all-important winner, the signal of intent from Tolios was typical of a team fuelled by a ‘never say die’ attitude.
With three rounds left to play, City leads seventh-placed Port Melbourne by one point and eighth-placed Melbourne Knights by two points.
City faces Manningham, and Heidelberg in the final three weeks, sandwiching a mouth-watering clash with Port Melbourne at home in round 25 that may well decide sixth place.
Port Melbourne’s run home is far more difficult, fixtures to tackle the current top two sides in Avondale and South Melbourne either side of the City clash, while the Knights have three winnable games against Oakleigh, Dandenong Thunder and Green Gully to close the season.
City next welcomes Manningham United to Frank Holohan Soccer Complex on Friday night.
It wasn’t quite the celebratory scenes for Dandenong Thunder, despite an impressive performance against premiership contenders Avondale on the road in a 2-1 loss.
A costly turnover from Daniel Alessi at the back saw the Avengers capitalise with a deflected goal at the back post to break the deadlock late in the first half.
Wade Dekker snuck past the Avengers’ defence to level the scores shortly after the halftime interval, his seventh of the season, but the scoreline was tied for only minutes, as Avondale restored their advantage at 2-1, following a Birkan Kirdar turnover.
Thunder heads to Churchill Reserve next week to face St Albans.
