Melbourne City FC will be looking to bounce back from a tough 1-3 loss at home against Preston Lions when they face Nunawading City in Round 13 of the NPL3 this Sunday.
The City boys would have gone into the Preston clash hungry for three points, but made a poor start when a scuffed defensive clearance spilled out to Matthew Cundari, who picked out the top right corner with an emphatic strike from the edge of the area.
The home team immediately rallied together and took it right up to the league leaders, with their resilience eventually awarded with a Moonib Adus goal in the 29th minute, the winger lashing the ball into the back of the net through a sea of legs in the six-yard box.
With the scores locked at 1-1 heading into the break, City looked like stealing important points from the NPL3’s team to beat, but Preston’s quickfire second-half double dashed those hopes emphatically.
The first goal arrived through Chris Davies in the 72nd minute, teed up at point-blank range by Ryu Yamagishi, before Bradley Blumenthal found the back of the net again just three minutes later when he was fed through on goal from midfield, powering his finish into the top left to confirm the 1-3 scoreline.
City has already had success against Nunawading City once this season, downing this weekend’s opposition 0-4 away from home in Round 2.
This time around, the boys will have to do without Marco Tilio and Stefan Colakovski, who both scored in the Round 2 win, with Jordan Bos and Jordi Valadon rounding out the goals on that occasion.
Nunawading currently occupy 7th place on the NPL3 table and have proven to be a high-scoring, heavily-conceding outfit, with only Melbourne City and Preston Lions boasting more than their 24 goals scored.
Against Ballarat City last weekend, Nunawading found the back of the net six times, with Daniel Maclennan bagging a hattrick to send him to the top of the NPL3 goalscoring charts with 10 goals in 10 games.
Behind Maclennan, Zois Ganelopolous has four goals, whilst James Brown and Paul Kuol have three each.
