Reds secure home final
ADELAIDE United will host a home elimination final and at the same time ended Western United’s slim hopes of securing a maiden Premier’s Plate on Sunday night.
Adelaide ended its regular season in fourth place with a 2-1 win over Western at Coopers Stadium.
Adelaide will most likely host the current fifth-placed Central Coast Mariners at Hindmarsh on Sunday in the elimination final. Third-placed Western is likely to face sixthplaced
Wellington Phoenix at AAMI Park on Saturday in the other knockout final.
Adelaide dashed Western’s Premier’s Plate hopes when the visitors needed to beat United by seven goals to have any chance of leapfrogging current league leader Melbourne Victory.
To realise the Premier’s Plate dream, Western also needed second-placed Melbourne City to drop maximum points in its final regular-season clash against Phoenix at home on Monday night.
A City win will give the club consecutive Premier’s Plates while Phoenix can equal Mariners on points with a win but needs to beat the reigning champion by a whopping 15 goals at AAMI Park to earn the fifth spot.
A City draw or loss on Monday will see Victory claim its first Premier’s Plate since 2015.
Nonetheless, Adelaide came from behind to record its fifth consecutive win and a chance to secure its first ALeague championship since 2016.
An Isaias gaffe gifted Western the opening goal when Lachlan Wales latched on to a wayward pass from the Spaniard near the halfway line.
Wales dribbled 40m unchallenged and looked up to square the ball to an unmarked Dylan Wenzel-Halls who tucked the ball home from 5m in the sixth minute. Kusini Yengi – back in action from a long-term leg injury for the first time since December – tested Western keeper Jamie Young’s reflexes with a shot from 12m, a minute later.
Javi Lopez equalised with a brilliant strike from 18m after a slow build-up before an intelligent assist from Bernardo Oliveira allowed the Spaniard time to aim for the top corner.
The 14th-minute goal coincided with Western’s solid stopper Nikolai Topor-Stanley receiving treatment for a foot injury on the sidelines before he was replaced by rookie Ben Collins. Ryan Kitto scored Adelaide’s second goal when he surged forward before unleashing a right-footed 20m chip into the top corner. MACARTHUR UNITED battled back from a goal down to earn a share of the points with a 1-1 draw against Western Sydney Wanderers.
The Wanderers opened the scoring in the 10th minute through Jarrod Carluccio.
But Tomi Juric levelled from the penalty spot 10 minutes into the second half.