Hakoah Sydney City-East 0-0 Sydney Olympic

Given that the big guns were playing each other this round and that a few of them would ultimately drop points, it was vital for Sydney Olympic to go to Hakoah on Mother’s Day and pick up the all-important 3 points. Unfortunately it was not to be as we had to settle for a scoreless draw on Sunday.

The first 25 minutes of the first-half were pretty uneventful. We came out and passed the ball around well but it was more or less useless possession amongst ourselves in the midfield, backwards and sideways stuff without any real penetrating forward passing movements. We looked comfortable and totally untroubled by a pretty meek Hakoah side it has to be said, but we struggled to create that real spark to turn our good possession into a flurry of good chances. During the latter part of that first-half we did have a couple of half-chances to open the scoring, but they turned to nothing as we just were not good enough and we were not able to capitalise on the chances, even if they were not clear-cut ones. After a pretty uneventful first-half the score remained 0-0 at the half-time break.

As if realising the urgency of the situation, Sydney Olympic came out in the second-half with a bit more purpose. We looked a lot more dangerous in attack and in doing so created a couple of golden chances to open the scoring and take the game by the scruff of the neck. Again some poor finishing as well as some fine saves by the Hakoah goalkeeper kept the scores at 0-0. We kept on pushing right up until the end but we could just not find the breakthrough. Apart from 1 real chance that Hakoah had, we were not really troubled in defence at all and we easily handled everything they threw at us. As it was, the stalemate could not be broken by either side and we had to settle for a 0-0 draw at full-time.

Take nothing away from Hakoah; they are a decent, well drilled side, with plenty of good players and it is always tough getting a result there, but our problems are there and have been there for all to see this season, our attack is weak and we just cannot score enough goals. 13 goals in our first 10 matches in the League shows this to be the case, the 3^rd worst attack in the League. Defensively we have been strong and our 9 goals conceded ranks us 1^st in the League, having conceded the least amount of goals in the League.

This time of the year the usual stories and rumours are swirling around, about potential signings to come in during the window. I cannot give you any definitive names but it is obvious if you have been watching the team, that we definitely need some cutting edge in the front third of the park. We need a proven goal-scorer at the very least.

In terms of the Club Championship, the U20’s grabbed a 1-0 win, whilst in the U18’s we recorded a 1-0 loss.

A re-cap of last Wednesday’s Round 6 FFA Cup Qualifier against Parramatta FC.

We started off poorly conceding a goal within the first 10 minutes. In general we were quite poor throughout that whole first-half and it looked like we were heading out of the competition.

We looked better in the second-half and 10 minutes into it, we received a penalty and thought here we go, this is our way back into the match, unfortunately it was missed and a sense of impending doom came over the Sydney Olympic Supporters. Our persistence paid off though as 2 late goals from Radovan Pavicevic and Yu Kuboki saw us overcome the deficit and Qualify for the next Round of FFA Cup Qualifying.

In Round 7 FFA Cup Qualifying we will play the winner of Dulwich Hill and Bankstown Berries.

Our next match is in the League and it is a Huge Must Win game at home against a resurgent Sutherland Sharks, on Sunday Afternoon, May 21, at Belmore Sports Ground, Kick-Off is at 3pm.

Get out there this Sunday and support Sydney Olympic.