Oh how great to get the season underway again after what seemed like a forever off-season only relieved by Soccer Australia's hilarious antics. The Newcastle Breakers came to Sydney, in the words of coach Lee Sterrey, a trifle underdone, and with that elusive away win against Olympic maybe out of grasp again. We were entertained by the usual fireworks which made a good attempt to set fire to the players lined up for the anthem and obscured the pitch for mins.
From the whistle Olympic 'Lions' (there was a rodenty excuse for one introduced as their mascot) pushed up hard with the Breakers on the back foot for nearly the first 12 mins, broken only by little Johnny Buonavoglia actually winning a ball in the air and then soon after Harps scrambling for the ball to see it bundled away by Bouhoutsos. Having weathered the storm speedster Peter Juchniewicz twice raided up the left flank, and the result was a corner from Vasco Trpcevski that Mick Wilson put away sweetly. 0-1 to Newcastle. Beware a mangy lion cornered for within 3 mins Ante Juric had not only raided forward but picking up the return ball from a wall pass, thumped it past Bobby Catlin. 1-1. The Breakers came back for a short spell but slowly faded as the half wore on. For the last 15 mins of the half Olympic battered at the Breakers shield and just when we were all expecting the half-time to be called Chris Kalantzis made it 2-1 bobbing up for nearly the first time behind the Shayne Pryce led defence.
In the second session there was drama as ex Breaker Scotty Thomas fouled Trpcevski, and having earned an earlier YC, Jeremy Blayney realised that a red was in order. Despite being a man down Olympic used their speed of movement to frustrate Newcastle. Andy Harper stood up to be counted and after a couple of misses picked up the flight of a clearance and headed all of 25m into the top of the net. 2-2. Despite Peter Zorbas hitting the side netting and some histrionics aimed at the referee Olympic couldn't break through the tiring Breakers formation, and indeed a 46min speculatative long shot from 40m on the left by Luke Tomich beat the keeper and grazed the cross bar thus saving Olympic from severe embarrassment.
Olympic were the better team on the night, combining well and with their quick interchanging game they severely taxed the Newcastle side. For their part, without the parts firing, the Breakers as a whole did enough for the draw and Lee Sterrey's suggestion of the need for 4 or 5 games before they gell could well be right. They showed more creativity and variation than in past years, and that's surely a good sign.
Best for Breakers: Catlin, M Wilson, Harper and a special mention on senior debut for Juchniewicz. For Olympic I'd suggest L Wilson, Juric, Kalantzis