Melbourne Victory finished its Foxtel Y-League season with a 2-0 loss to Brisbane Roar at Lakeside Stadium on Friday.
Summary
Victory wasted numerous chances before falling behind to a goal from Shannon Brady on the stroke of half-time.
After a relatively even second half, Daniel Leck sealed the Roar’s win from the penalty spot.
Victory controlled the opening 15 minutes, dictating the tempo in warm conditions.
Birkan Kirdar, 16, curled a free-kick wide from 25 yards for Victory approaching the midway point of the half as both teams started to settle.
The game came to life from the half-hour mark, with Kirdar denied in a one-on-one by Roar goalkeeper Macklin Freke.
Freke then pushed away a long-range effort from Kirdar before Brisbane had a goal ruled out for offside.
Victory created numerous chances approaching half-time, the best of which fell to Yazid Said, who blazed wide when put in by Kirdar.
And the host was punished at the other end, Brady breaking down the left before finishing into the bottom corner.
Victory goalkeeper Matthew Sutton also made a big one-on-one save in first-half additional time.
Brisbane made the better start to the second half, with Bryce Bafford poking a one-on-one chance wide in the 57th minute.
Victory went close to an equaliser 15 minutes later, but Brandon Lauton hit the side-netting from an angle after a nice run down the left.
Instead, Brisbane sealed its win in the 80th minute, Leck sending Sutton the wrong way from the penalty spot after a foul by Thierry Iradukunda in the area.
Head coach Gareth Naven’s post-match thoughts
“I think our last game of the Y-League, we’ve done really well in regards to possession, our duels, created goalscoring opportunities. What we need to get better at is converting those opportunities into a score. There were many chances where we put crosses in, we were in front of goals, not clinical, not sharp enough, but we can get better at that.
“In a possession sense, we dominated our opponent in regards to on the ball and defensively I thought we were solid as a whole. I know that we’ve got to make sure teams earn everything from us and I thought at times we were a bit cheap which opened us up. When we opened up, they were quite clinical. We need to get better at not doing things cheaply and we can get better at that. As a whole, I was happy with the way the performance went – our structure, our performance principles, I thought the boys did really well in the conditions which weren’t favourable for any team but looking at them and looking at us, I thought we came off very well.”
Result
Foxtel Y-League 2018/19 Round 10
Melbourne Victory 0
Brisbane Roar 2 (Shannon Brady 45′, Daniel Leck 80′ pen)
Victory: Matthew Sutton (gk); Daniel Aye, Benjamin Carrigan (c), Aaron Anderson (Matthew Bozinovski 84′), So Nishikawa; Jack Morton (Aydin Mustedanagic 77′); Thierry Iradukunda, Birkan Kirdar, Brandon Lauton; Yazid Said (Liston Diaz 71′), Jack Palazzolo.
