Ourimbah 2 – 1 Gosford
Our match of the round this week took place at the home of the Men’s Division One league leaders, Ourimbah, where they welcomed a side that has shown significant improvement throughout the season in Gosford.
It was a match of great importance for both sides. Ourimbah was looking to push ever closer to Premier League promotion, while Gosford wanted to continue their recent good form to push into finals contention.
However, only one team can win, and on this occasion, it was the hosts who dramatically came from behind late to snatch a victory and cement themselves even further in first place.
Of all the matches of the round so far, this one was far and away the most physical. From the first whistle until the last, both teams hounded each other in possession, resulting in a rapid game that saw both teams cover a lot of ground.
Given how quickly each team was shutting the other down, it took a while for chances to fall for either side, but they did show off how they were looking to play.
Ourimbah’s intent was to push down the wings, particularly their right wing. In the first half, they attempted to overload that side, with their wingback Joshua-Adam Fletcher constantly pushing forward to support his winger Lachlan Kroemer.
While Gosford favoured a more open style, relying on their midfielders to distribute to whatever option was the most open up front, often to their striker Jackson Jacobs, who did everything during his time on the field, from dropping deep to become a creator to running onto long balls looking to score.
Ourimbah had the first real chance when their work down the right led to a cross into the box that found a wide-open Jacob Gilbert. Gilbert took the ball cleanly but put his shot wide left, not troubling Ethan Giles in the gloves for Gosford.
This would be the Falcons’ best chance in the first half, as the Dragons’ defence proved difficult to break down.
Their right back, Ian Yates, was defending particularly well. He completely locked down his side and forced Ourimbah to send it right. However, they were getting stopped on that sidetoo, allowing Gosford to launch more attacks as Ourimbah struggled for quality chances.
The Dragon’s first half-chance came when Emerson Baratto from midfield played Jacobs centrally inside the Ourimbah half, who played it to his right where Brock Crumpton wrapped around into open space with a good look at goal, but his shot went high and wide.
Still, this was some solid interplay on Gosford’s part, and it began a period of the game during which they asked more questions than the Falcons, and soon enough, they would find the opener.
It came when Ourimbah’s Jack Bennett became the first of many names put into the book for a foul on Crumpton. This left the Dragons with a freekick out to the left of the field just around the edge of the final third.
Gosford made the most of the set piece, sending the cross into the perfect area to cause issues for Ourimbah just deep of the near post. There, the ball met the top of Yates’ head, looping up and down over Drew Ryan-Lawther’s head in the net for Ourimbah and over the line to make it 1-0 to Gosford.
With around fifteen minutes to go in the half, it felt like Ourimbah would spring to life and show their championship calibre, but despite their efforts, Gosford continued to frustrate them. They played out the half smartly to hold onto their 1-0 lead into halftime.
At the resumption of the game, Gosford maintained their intensity, fighting for the ball all across the park and not allowing Ourimbah to get any sort of flow. In doing this, they often found themselves fouling the Falcons to disrupt them, and with Ourimbah not managing to get high-quality shots from these freekicks, the plan appeared to be working.
In the midst of this, Kroemer swapped wings to play down the left, and his matchup against Yates became one of the most compelling aspects of the game.
First blood went to Kromer, who ran down the left wing and took on Yates, beating him before putting in a great ball across the box to Spencer Wharton. He was unlucky to get forced wide before he could get a shot off, seeing the chance fade.
But Yates would get him back at the next time of asking only moments later when Kroemer took him on again, this time in the box. Yates put in a risky slide challenge and executed it perfectly, shutting down the Ourimbah momentum.
They would tussle with one another for the rest of the game but no further chances would fall to Ourimbah there, and as time continued to tick by, it felt like the 1-0 lead was enough.
Around seventy minutes in, it became apparent that Gosford were ever so slightly taking their foot off the gas, largely thanks to a strong defensive effort from the Falcons that did not allow them to create as much as they had earlier in the game.
It felt at this moment like the game was reaching a stalemate, but then one of the goals of the season flew into the Gosford net.
Now playing more as a pure winger, Fletcher received the ball from Harrison Wedesweilerwide right close along the sideline. Surprisingly, Fletcher had space and time to put in his cross, as this was the first time all game that Gosford left back Henry Rodgers didn’t manage to close him down.
So, in open space, Fletcher put the ball in, and instead of finding the head of a teammate, it soared into the far side of the net, stunning the visitors and making the scoreline 1-1 from nothing.
This was a dramatic enough moment that the game could have ended here, and it would have been a memorable finish, but the twists only get bigger.
Springing back to life again, the Dragons began to throw everyone forward in hopes of finding a winner, and almost instantly, Ourimbah’s Harrison Montgomery was sent off for accruing a second yellow card after stopping Jacobs from progressing a counterattack.
Now with a one-man advantage and desperate to avoid dropping two points, Gosford tried everything they could, but now it was them getting frustrated, as the third Ourimbah Harrison, Harrison Bennett, stepped up at the back for the Falcons and shut down every attack the Dragons sent his way, leaving them with almost no chances to show for their numbers advantage.
With time dwindling, this game looked destined to be a valiant draw for the league leaders, but in injury time, they showed why they have dominated the competition all season when they found a miraculous winner.
Once again, the chance came from the right, this time from Gilbert, who had been fighting up top all game to no avail. This time, he beat his man in the box with some tidy footwork, and still to the right of the box, he put in a perfect shot across Giles and into the far side of the net to mark a remarkable comeback and earn an incredible 2-1 victory.
The whistle signalled full-time not long after ending a spectacular game in style for the hosts, as Gosford were left to wonder what happened.
Speaking to Gosford Coach Shea Taylor after the match, he noted how great his side’s efforts were for seventy minutes but conceded that sometimes losing games late is just the nature of the game.
“It’s a hard pill to swallow, but it is what it is. That’s football”, Taylor began.
“I felt that we were superior for seventy minutes. We did allow Ourimbah a couple of run-ins, but I thought we were very competitive.”
Match Official – Hugo Fonseca
Written by Mark Goodyear
Men’s Division 1 Results –
Women’s Division 1 Results –
