By Eva Worden (@evajworden)

St Albans Saints has jumped into second position on the ladder, after a dominating 5-0 victory over Ballarat Red Devils in Round 3 at Morshead Park on Saturday afternoon.

A big crowd poured in to Morshead Park to watch Ballarat’s second home game, but their enthusiasm was quickly quashed by five St Albans goals from four different goalscorers.

The first goal from Saints’ Ryan McGuffie came just 9 minutes into the match, with McGuffie making no mistake, coolly finishing past Aaron Romein.

At 25 minutes, some brilliant interplay between Trent Watserson and Tedros Yabio found Nicholas Scerri, who made no mistake and gave the visitors a 2-0 lead.

Ballarat pushed to get themselves back in the game through Shaun Romein, but the captain couldn’t find a way through the visitors’ defence.

Just minutes from half-time, Scerri almost made it 3-0.

He hit a sweetly-struck volley, only for it to hit the goal post, with the rebound causing mayhem in the box as Yabio and Ballarat custodian Aaron Romein fighting it out to be first to it.

But it wasn’t to be for St Albans and they went into the half 2-0 up.

The Red Devils came out with fire in their eyes in the second half, pushing forward and an equaliser looking promising, but it was to no avail as their hopes were quashed at the hour mark.

St Albans’ Scerri got his second of the match by putting the ball into an unoccupied goal.

That goal finally woke Ballarat up, with some brilliant play at 69 minutes finally finding them a goal, only for it to be deemed offside.

The Saints continued to push the home side until Waterson’s touch rolled in the goal at 71 minutes and the deflation of the Devils was obvious.

The game then slowed and the Devils’ strikers were unable to breach the Saints’ defence and the game seemed to be at an end.

That was until Barry Devlin from the Saints finished with an unexpected header goal three minutes into injury time, and giving the visitors three points and five goals to add to their goal difference.

 

MATCH DETAILS

Ballarat Red Devils 0 defeated by St Albans Saints 5 (McGuffie 9’, Scerri 25’ 60’, Waterson 71’, Devlin 90+3’) at Morshead Park.

Ballarat Red Devils: 1. Aaron ROMEIN, 4. David KING, (6. Liam Harding 46’)8. Joshua ROMEIN, 10. Micheal TRIGGER, 11. Nelson SALVATORE, 14. Daniel FIRTH, 15. Dominic SWINTON, 17. Shaun ROMEIN, (21. Charles KING 69’) (22. Patrick KARRAS 46’) 23. Daniel TINKER, 28. Callum FERGUSON, 31. Simon MURPHY

Unused Subs: 13. Scott LAMONT, 40. Jason HILL

Yellow Cards: Harding 81’

Red Cards: Nil

St Albans Saints: 1. Stuart WEBSTER, 2. Ryan MCGUFFIE, 4. Nicholas SARBIN, 5. Tedros YABIO, (6. Budimir MATKO 86’) 7. Trent WATERSON, 8. Ross HARVEY, 9. Barry DEVLIN, 11. Nicholas SCERRI, 12. Damien PETERS, (13. Anthony BORAS 82’) 18. Ben SHAPER, 23. Daniel SWEENEY

Unused Subs: 3. Nana Yaw OTUO-ACHEAMPONG, 10. Yusuf YUSUF, 21. John SCOLLO

Yellow Cards: Harvey 14’, Peters 40’, Sweeney 88’

Red Cards: Nil

PHOTO: Ballarat Courier