Melbourne Victory welcomes the North Geelong Warriors to Epping Stadium in the NPL2 West on Sunday.
Summary
A 10-man Victory suffered a narrow 1-0 loss to Northcote City at John Cain Memorial Park in its last outing.
Victory, without the likes of Anthony Lesiotis, Birkan Kirdar, Brandon Lauton and Benjamin Carrigan, fought hard but fell short away from home.
The defeat came despite a brilliant penalty save from 19-year-old goalkeeper Matthew Sutton early in the second half.
Victory will be without Aaron Anderson, 18, for the clash with the Warriors in Round 26 after the centre-back’s red card against Northcote.
The meeting with the Warriors is one of Victory’s three remaining games this season.
Victory is taking on North Geelong for the second time this campaign, having recorded a 1-0 win when the sides met in April.
Head coach Gareth Naven’s pre-match thoughts
“This week brings a really good challenge for us. North Geelong are obviously high up the table in the west conference and are a strong, aggressive team. We challenged them really well in the first game and we’re looking to do that again at home at Epping. It gives some of our younger players who haven’t been exposed to the level an understanding of what they need to do to make sure they have a good attitude, good effort and understand the level that’s required in a really challenging competition in the west conference in the NPL2.”
This week
NPL2 West 2019 Round 26
Melbourne Victory v North Geelong Warriors
Sunday, August 25, 3.00pm AEST
Epping Stadium, Melbourne
U20 NPL2 West 2019 Round 26
Melbourne Victory v North Geelong Warriors
Sunday, August 25, 12.30pm AEST
Epping Stadium, Melbourne
U18 NPL West 2019 Round 25
Melbourne Victory v Werribee City
Sunday, August 25, 10.45am AEST
Partridge Street Reserve, Melbourne
U15 NPL West 2019 Round 25
Melbourne Victory v Werribee City
Sunday, August 25, 9.00am AEST
Partridge Street Reserve, Melbourne
Last week
NPL2 West: Northcote City 1 Victory 0
U20 NPL2 West: Northcote City 2 Victory 4 (Lethlean 54′, Urbina 59′, Diaz 62′, Tountas 82′)
U18 NPL West: Avondale 2 Victory 5 (Moukachar 23′ pen, Paneras 38′, Dinatale 49′, Anastovski 78′, Gust 89′)
