Report by Gunther De Vos

Inglewood United treated its home fans to a sparkling 3-0 victory in the opening round of the PS4 NPLWA season with Brian Woodall, Mark Pritchard and Callum O’Connell on target against Floreat Athena.

A depleted Floreat side managed to stay in the game deep into the match, and after conceding the first goal on the hour mark they still had hope of salvaging a draw at Inglewood Stadium.

But Inglewood blew away any doubts with two goals in the last seven minutes to grab the points.

“Three points, three goals and a clean sheet - we have more than one reason to be happy today,” said a satisfied Inglewood coach Taki Nicolaidis.

“We had a lot of possession and we could have scored more goals earlier on in the game. We were a bit wasteful with our opportunities, but this is a result to celebrate.”

In the first half of the game, Inglewood created scoring opportunities through Woodall, Ashley Rosindale and Scott Blackmore without success.

Early in the second half, Floreat goalkeeper Dejan Aleksic did well again to keep Pritchard from an opening goal. But in the 60th minute, the goalkeeper was beaten when Woodall fired home to give Inglewood the advantage.

The lead was well deserved. Despite a couple of attempts from outside the box, Floreat had struggled to pose a serious menace to Inglewood goalkeeper Alex Dunn.

Any hopes of a fightback were extinguished by Pritchard’s powerful strike in the 83rd minute and O’Connell’s finish with two minutes of normal time left.

“Even at 0-0 or 1-0, Floreat could never really cause any problems to us,” Nicolaidis said. “I think Floreat is a team that will do really well this season. To beat them is a very good result for us, but we shouldn’t get carried away. We need to confirm this result in next week’s game.”

It was a significant turnaround on last season’s results between the teams with Floreat beating Inglewood 3-1 and 3-0.

Floreat coach Glen Grostrate took some positives from the match.

“Everybody must realise that we missed six key players due to injuries and suspensions,” he said. “But even with a young team, we managed to stay in the game for a long time against a strong opponent. We fought hard and did what we could do. We can build on that in the next games.”

Inglewood United 3 (Woodall 60min, Pritchard 83, O’Connell 88)
Floreat Athena 0
Saturday, April 19, 2016
Inglewood Stadium
Kick-off: 7:00 pm

Inglewood United: 1. Alex DUNN (GK), 5. Adam TONG (2. Rikki SMITH 89), 3. David CYRUS, 4. Scott BLACKMORE, 6. Callum O’CONNELL, 14. Mark PRITCHARD, 8. Jason BARRERA, 18. Jason COLLI (16. Paul ZIMARINO 85), 10. Ash ROSINDALE (7. Kenny KEOGH 76), 11. John MIGAS, 9. Brian WOODALL.
Substitutes not used: 15. Aleksandar JOVIC, 20. Mitchell PAPAS.
Yellow cards: Rosindale 46, Cyrus 55
Red cards: nil

Floreat Athena: 23. Dejan ALEKSIC (GK), 13. Aaron DELANEY, 5. Bobby WILSON, 15. Christopher SALDARIS, 6. Clayton ARNEZ, 11. Dennis GALAN (18. Matthew IZZO 75), 12. Declan HARGREAVES, 3. Blair GOVAN, 8. Jonathan STYNES, 2. Jarrod MCNALLY (17. Ludovic BOI 65), 4. Andrew SCALDAFERRO (16. Sam KHANKHALILI 87).
Substitutes not used: 1. Aidan HOLLOWAY.
Yellow cards: C. Saldaris 53, McNally 65
Red cards: nil