After the Youth League broke for the mid-season Christmas break, Melbourne City’s Youth will return to action this Friday evening when they travel North to take on the Brisbane Roar Youth.
At the halfway point of the season City are well positioned to defend their 2016/17 Y-League title, sitting atop of Group A with a three-point buffer over second placed Adelaide United.
With their goal difference of +11 head and shoulders above that of their Group A rivals – next closest is Adelaide United again with +4 – Joe Palatsides’ side are firmly in the box seat to advance to the end of season championship game against Group B’s winners.
Having had a bye in round 5, City’s last game was all the way back on December the 9th, when the came from a goal behind to defeat the Perth Glory Youth 2-1 at the City Football Academy (CFA).
After the Glory’s Henry Hore put them ahead in the 57th minute, City got themselves level thanks to a world class free kick from captain Denis Genreau in the 73rd minute.
Six minutes later substitute Marko Delic seized upon a loose ball to score his first goal of the Y-League season and give City the 2-1 win.
A number of injuries and senior promotions meant that Palatsides had been forced to make six changes to his side leading into the clash, and the Head of Academy was pleased that his squad had weathered the upheaval in the starting XI and going a goal behind:
“It was a really good performance,” Palatsides said.
“When you change that amount of players in a week – there were six changes from the starting line-up last week – the boys have to have a bit of continuity in the way they play.
“You could see early on we struggled a bit with that and then slowly we grinded ourselves back into it,” he went on to say.
“This is a much younger squad than we had in previous weeks and for them to be able to come up against Perth – who are a very good team and gave us a really hard run for it today – especially after going 1-0 down was tremendous to see.”
This week’s opponents the Brisbane Roar suffered a defeat in their last match, going down 4-1 to Adelaide United in round 5.
Going into the half locked at 1-1, the Roar were unable to contain a rampant United in the second half as the Reds added three second half goals to run out comfortable winners.
The Roar currently sit in third position on the Group A table, with wins against the Melbourne Victory and Perth Glory and losses against United and City.
The Roar’s loss to City came in round 1 of the Y-League season, when three City first half goals were enough for City to be awarded the game after a torrential downpour at the CFA forced the abandonment of play in the 50th minute.
Match Details
Foxtel Y-League Round 6
Friday, 29 December 2017
Brisbane Roar FC vs Melbourne City FC
Venue: Lanham Park, Brisbane
Kick-off: 5.30pm
