Glory were unable to build on last weekend’s draw with reigning Champions Central Coast Mariners as a ruthless Melbourne City ran out 5-0 winners at HBF Park on Sunday.
View full match highlights HERE
View David Zdrilic’s post-match media conference HERE
Although the home side more than held their own for much of the first half, they found themselves 2-0 down at the break as midfielder Steven Ugarkovic netted twice in the space of six minutes.
2-0 became 3-0 seconds after the restart when Andreas Kuen capitalised upon some hesitant defending and City added further gloss to the scoreline late on with Yonatan Cohen curling home their fourth, before Medin Memeti tapped in number five from close range.
There was little sign of what was to come during the early exchanges as Cristian Caicedo, making his first start for Glory, fired wide and the home side continued to probe away at the City defence.
But the complexion of the game changed six minutes before the break when the ball broke kindly for Ugarkovic on the edge of the box and he picked out the far corner.
The former Newcastle Jets man soon doubled his and City’s tally, reacting quickest in a packed box to tuck the ball past Oli Sail.
Glory needed to start the second half well in order to reclaim a foothold in the game, but instead they were left with a mountain to climb as Austrian import Kuen tok full advantage of some defensive indiscipline to make it 3-0.
Glory went close to reducing the arrears shortly after the hour-mark when Adam Taggart fizzed a 20m strike narrowly wide, but the final quarter belonged to Aurelio Vidmar’s side as Cohen cut in from the right and bent a shot into the far corner and Memeti rounded out the scoring with the simplest of finishes two minutes from time.
Match Details
Isuzu UTE A-League 2024/25 Season Round 4
Perth Glory 0 Melbourne City 5 (Ugarkovic 39′, 44′, Kuen 46′, Cohen 83′, Memeti 88′)
Half-time: 0-2
HBF Park
Sunday 10 November 2024
Referee: Daniel Cook
Attendance: 7338
Perth Glory: 1.Oli SAIL (gk), 5.Lachlan BARR, 7.Nicholas PENNINGTON, 12.Taras GOMULKA, 15.Zach LISOLAJSKI, 17.Jarrod CARLUCCIO, 20.Trent OSTLER ((6.Brandon O’NEILL 46′) 46′), 21.Abdul FAISAL (10.Nikola MILEUSNIC 46′) (14.Nathanael BLAIR 61′), 22.Adam TAGGART (c), 23.Cristian CAICEDO (26.Khoa NGO 79′), 33.Luis CANGA
Substitutes not used: 13.Cameron COOK (gk), 16.Adam BUGARIJA, 24.Andriano LEBIB
Yellow Cards: Pennington
Red Cards: None
Melbourne City: 33. Patrick BEACH (GK), 2. Callum TALBOT, 6. Steven UGARKOVIC, 10. Yonatan COHEN, 13. Nathaniel ATKINSON, 19. Zane SCHREIBER (42. Ben DUNBAR 79′), 26. Samuel SOUPRAYEN (22. Germán FERREYRA 87′), 27. Kai TREWIN, 30. Andreas KUEN (7. Mathew LECKIE 72′), 35. Medin MEMETI, 38. Harry POLITIDIS (47. Kavian RAHMANI 87′)
Substitutes not used: 1. Jamie YOUNG (GK), 8. James JEGGO, 46. Ben MAZZEO
Yellow Cards: None
Red Cards: None
#ONEGlory
