City Insider - Semi Final - 20/06/21

CITY INSIDER

MELBOURNE CITY FC vs MACARTHUR FC SUNDAY 20 JUNE, 2021 KICK-OFF 4.05 PM

MELBOURNE CITY v MACARTHUR FC

CITY INSIDER SUNDAY 20 JUNE

CAPTAIN’S MESSAGE CITY FANS, IT’S THE DAY WE’VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR. OUR SEMI FINAL IS HERE AND A SPOT IN THE GRAND FINAL IS UP FOR GRABS THIS AFTERNOON. We were extremely disappointed during the week when we found out that the match had been moved from our home of AAMI Park, interstate to New South Wales. After finishing on top of the table, we earnt the right to a home Semi Final and its disappointing that we’ve had that taken away, especially given the fact we couldn’t play at home in last season’s Finals either.

I must acknowledge and say a big thanks to all of those who have been working tirelessly behind the scenes at the Club, not just in the last couple of weeks in regard to this situation but all season long.

Absolutely everything was done to firstly let fans into the stadium to come and watch, and then secondly to keep the game in Melbourne. Ultimately these decisions were made by the Victorian Government and the APL and out of the hands of the Club, despite the hard work and efforts of everyone involved.

In terms of the playing group, while of course we’d absolutely much prefer to be playing at home in front of our City family, we are 100% focused on the job at hand.

We’ll play anyone, anytime, anywhere and will be doing absolutely everything we can to ensure we qualify for a second consecutive Grand Final, and then the fight will begin behind the scenes to ensure we can play it in Melbourne in front of you.

I’m honoured to this afternoon break the Club appearance record, especially doing so by overtaking such a great player and bloke in David Williams. I’ve loved my time at the Club and I hope I’ve made you proud over the four years and hopefully into the future.

Enjoy the game tonight whether it be from your lounge room, the pub, or even here with us in Sydney for those lucky few. We hope to see you at AAMI Park next week and will do everything we can to get the job done tonight and ensure that’s the case.

C’mon City!

Scott Jamieson Melbourne City FC captain

Together We Move

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MELBOURNE CITY v MACARTHUR FC

CITY INSIDER SUNDAY 20 JUNE

ANYONE, ANYWHERE, ANYTIME GET READY, CITY FANS! TONIGHT IS OUR OPPORTUNITY TO CLAIM THE MASSIVE THREE POINTS THAT WOULD ALLOW THE BOYS TO MATHEMATICALLY WRAP UP THE 2020/21 A-LEAGUE PREMIERSHIP AND LIFT THE PREMIERS PLATE ON THE PITCH POST-MATCH! After losing several key players to injury and international duty, we’ve endured an underwhelming run of form of late, taking just one point from our final three games of the regular season.

Last Thursday, we succumbed to a loss against Newcastle Jets despite having taken the early lead through Stefan Colakovski.

The 21-year-old’s close-range finish was cancelled out by a superb curling effort by Archie Goodwin in the 23rd minute, before Apostolos Stamatelopoulos rose to head home an 89th-minute winner from Lucas Mauragis’ free-kick.

Whilst we went into the match without Craig Noone, who had been sidelined for several weeks, we also lost Rostyn Griffiths and

Andrew Nabbout by half-time, with both having sustained injuries in the opening period.

The youthful attacking trio of City did their best but couldn’t find their way past a resolute Newcastle defensive unit marshalled superbly by Nicolai Topor-Stanley, who made several goal-saving interventions on the night.

Determined to return to their best football, our City boys will have been eagerly awaiting tonight’s clash with Macarthur FC in a bid to progress to a second Grand Final in as many years. Things were made tougher on Thursday when it was announced the fixture had been relocated to New South Wales, but no doubt our City boys are ready to go, anytime, anywhere.

Macarthur finished the A-League regular season in 6th place but pulled off an upset win over Central Coast Mariners in last Saturday’s Elimination Final that went all the way to extra time before the deadlock could be broken.

Macarthur’s Matt Derbyshire was the closest challenger to Jamie Maclaren for the Golden Boot, with the striker finishing the regular season with 14 goals to his name. The Bulls will be without James Meredith, who received a red card in the 75th minute of his team’s Elimination Final against Central Coast.

DANGER PLAYER

SEASON STATS - MACARTHUR FC

A-LEAGUE PREVIEW

ADAM FEDERICI One of Macarthur’s best performing players all season, and one of the reasons they were able to qualify for Finals in their first season was the play of goalkeeper Adam Federici.

The 16-time Socceroo has enjoyed life in his first season in the A-League, keeping seven clean sheets across the season so far.

The 36-year-old has received media plaudits all season for his play, and with Jamie Maclaren and Connor Metcalfe responsible for three out of City’s four goals against the Bulls this season, City will have to find another way past the Macarthur shotstopper today.

6

11

LEAGUE POSITION

GAMES WON

33

36

GOALS SCORED

GOALS CONCEDED

A-LEAGUE LADDER

LAST RESULT

LAST TIME WE MET

CENTRAL COAST

0

MACARTHUR FC

1

MACARTHUR FC

2

MELBOURNE CITY

1

A-League 2020/21 - Elimination Final Saturday 12 June, 2021 Central Coast Stadium

VIDEO HIGLIGHTS

A-League 2019/20 - Match Week 18 Saturday 24 April, 2021 Campbelltown Stadium

VIDEO HIGLIGHTS

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MELBOURNE CITY v MACARTHUR FC

CITY INSIDER SUNDAY 20 JUNE

OUR CITYROOS CONTINUE TO SHINE IN RECENT WEEKS, CITY FANS HAVE HAD THE PLEASURE OF WATCHING THEIR FAVOURITE PLAYERS FROM THE CLUB REPRESENT AUSTRALIA ON THE NATIONAL STAGE. Jamie Maclaren, Connor Metcalfe and Curtis Good have all featured for the Socceroos in the second round of its World Cup qualification, while recently signed Mathew Leckie also saw plenty of action, twice taking the armband.

This has been an opportunity afforded to fans since the 2012/13 season, when Aziz Behich and Michael Marrone joined experienced Socceroo Richard Garcia to feature in the EAFF East Asian Cup, the former pair becoming the first Melbourne City players to make their international debut whilst at the Club.

Whilst fans have since seen several more City stars pull on the green and gold, including the likes of Aaron Mooy, Tim Cahill and – more recently – Jamie Maclaren, the unique pride that comes with seeing ‘one of our own’ make their senior debut for Australia wasn’t experienced by fans for several years after the breakthroughs of Behich and Marrone.

This changed in June 2018, when Daniel Arzani was substituted on in the 84th minute of an international friendly against the Czech Republic to become the first Melbourne City youth academy product to debut for the Socceroos.

Arzani’s breakout 2017/18 season had seen him progress from scoring the winning goal in the Final of the previous season’s Y-League, to being named to the A-League Team of the Season, whilst also earning the Harry Kewell Medal for the best under-23 player in the competition.

Arzani would go on to score just one minute into his substitute appearance in the very next game against Hungary, sneaking his shot under the keeper to score Australia’s first in an impressive 2-1 victory. Arzani has since totalled six Socceroos caps overall and featured in all three of Australia’s group stage games at the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Melbourne City’s production line has continued to bear fruit since Arzani’s breakout year, as evidenced from the Club’s influence in the most recent Socceroos squad that went 4-0 in the past two weeks as it secured a place in third round World Cup qualification.

Whilst the brilliant A-League form of both Jamie Maclaren and Curtis Good earned the pair deserved national team call-ups, Good’s Socceroos return especially heartwarming given his long road to get back to that level, it was Connor Metcalfe’s debut that really got

the fans excited.

The 21-year-old became Socceroo #611 when he was subbed on for Kenny Dougall in the 62nd minute against Chinese Taipei, looking supremely comfortable on the ball from the outset. The youngster then stepped up his game in his second showing, playing the full 90 against Nepal as he and Jackson Irvine dominated the midfield together from their holding positions.

With Denis Genreau also debuting in the same fixture against Chinese Taipei, City has now contributed three youngsters from its academy set-up to the Australian senior national team, and the conveyor belt of talent doesn’t appear to be slowing down any time soon.

The club has been amongst the league’s biggest proponents of promoting younger players to its first-team environment this season, with the likes of Marco Tilio, Stefan Colakovski and Kerrin Stokes all making the swift leap to senior football in 2020/21.

Whether it’s one of these names who are soon making their Socceroos debut, or a talent just waiting for their chance to explode on the big stage, Melbourne City will undoubtedly have plenty to contribute for Australian football going forward.

MATCH SQUADS

HEAD COACH: PATRICK KISNORBO

A-LEAGUE

1. TOM GLOVER

2. SCOTT GALLOWAY

3. SCOTT JAMIESON

4. NUNO REIS

5. DANIEL GEORGIEVSKI

7. ROSTYN GRIFFITHS

8. AIDEN O’NEILL

9. JAMIE MACLAREN

10. FLORIN BERENGUER

11. CRAIG NOONE

13. NATHANIEL ATKINSON

14. NAOKI TSUBAKI

15. ANDREW NABBOUT

16. TARAS GOMULKA

17. STEFAN COLACOVSKI

18. CONNOR METCALFE

19. BEN GARUCCIO

20. ADRIAN LUNA

22. CURTIS GOOD

23. MARCO TILIO

33. MATT SUTTON

35. RAPHAEL BORGES RODRIGUES

36. KERRIN STOKES

38. JORDAN BOS

42. AHMED TALEB

1 16

ADAM FEDERICI NICK SUMAN

2 3 6 7 12 13 15 23

JAKE MCGING ANTONY GOLEC ALEKSANDAR JOVANOVIC IVAN FRANJIC JAMES MEREDITH YIANNI NICOLAOU ALEKSANDAR SUSNJAR WALTER SCOTT

4 5 8 10 21 22 29

BENAT ETXEBARRIA MARK MILLIGAN DENIS GENREAU LOIC PUYO JAKE HOLLMAN LIAM ROSE ANTONIS MARTIS

9 11 14 19 27 31 33

MILISLAV POPOVIC TOMMY OAR MOUDI NAJJAR MICHAEL RUHS MATT DERBYSHIRE LACHLAN ROSE MARKEL SUSAETA

HEAD COACH: ANTE MILICIC

MACARTHUR FC

MELBOURNE CITY v MACARTHUR FC

CITY INSIDER SUNDAY 20 JUNE

CITY SUFFER DEFEAT AS NPL RETURNS Melbourne City suffered defeat against league leaders Preston Lions in the NPL3 on Saturday afternoon, going down 1-3 at Casey Fields in its first match in almost a month.

Petr Kratky was able to bring some cross ricocheting between familiar names back into the lineup legs and spilling out to for the clash, with Lucas Byrns, Moonib Adus, who lashed Charbel Shamoon and Alec Mills all the ball into the bottom starting the encounter after missing corner. the Ballarat fixture. Alexander The match fell into a Menelaou also made his first start holding pattern following the since Round 5. goal, with both teams It was a poor start from City, with a finding chances difficult to scuffed defensive clearance spilling come by and the scoreline out to Matthew Cundari, who rifled remaining at 1-1 as the the ball into the top right corner for referee blew his whistle for Preston’s opener less than a minute half-time. into the encounter.

Max Caputo had a brilliant The team immediately rallied opportunity to put City together though, and the game got ahead early in the second off to an evenly balanced opening half, meeting Adus’ cross period following the early goal. from the left but powering City’s resilience was rewarded in the his header directly at 29th minute when Byrns forced his Preston keeper Matthew way into the box from a wide area, Symes for the comfortable with his ensuing save in the 52nd minute.

Despite the game initially coming to life early in the second period, both sides struggled to make inroads into the opposition penalty area over the next 20 minutes as the game was hotly contested in midfield.

With the game still looking like it could go either way heading into the 72nd minute, it very quickly became a one-sided affair as the visiting team landed two blows in quick succession to make it 1-3. The first goal arrived through Chris Davies, who was teed up at point-blank range by Ryu Yamagishi, before Bradley Blumenthal found the back of the net again just three minutes later.

Preston controlled the game from that stage onward, forcing Taleb into some important saves to ensure the final scoreline remained just the two goals in the visitors’ favour.

SEASON STATS - MELBOURNE CITY NPL

NPL PREVIEW

WHAT'S NEXT? Melbourne City will look to bounce back from today’s loss when we take on Nunawading FC at home in Round 13 action next Sunday.

These teams have already met once this season, City scoring a comprehensive 4-0 win away from home back in Round 4.

Stefan Colakovski and Jordan Bos were both on the scoresheet before half time on that day, before Marco Tilio and Jordi Valadon netted within two minutes of each other in the second half to seal the big win.

2

6

LEAGUE POSITION

GAMES WON

28

10

GOALS SCORED

GOALS CONCEDED

NPL 3 LADDER

LAST RESULT

NEXT MATCH

MELBOURNE CITY

1

MELBOURNE CITY

PRESTON

3

NUNAWADING CITY FC

NPL 3 Victoria 2021 - Round 12 Saturday 19 June, 2021 Casey Fields

NPL 3 Victoria 2021 - Round 12 Saturday 27 June, 2021 KO: 3.00pm Casey Fields

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MELBOURNE CITY v MACARTHUR FC

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CITY INSIDER SUNDAY 20 JUNE

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