Wellington Phoenix season is over

After a lot efforts to realocate to Australia to play the final regular season matches, Wellington Phoenix failed once again to win in the elimination final as they were surpassed by Perth Glory by 1-0. Glory that was ranked 6th in the regular season will be certainly satisfied to beat the 3rd ranked-team in the process – now Glory continues in the run as Phoenix season is over.

Ufuk Talay guided Phoenix to its best ever regular season campaign despite only one win after the resumption of A-League. Until the forced break in March, Phoenix was enjoying a fantastic season, but the team never could get the same level of performances after the return of the competition.

In the decisive match played at Bankwest Stadium, Glory almost scored in the starting minutes of play, but Bruno Fornaroli was denied by Stefan Marinovic. The All Whites‘ defender Te Atawhai Hudson-Wihongi started the match alongside Steven Taylor in defense – in place of the injured Luke DeVere – and minutes later of Fornaroli’s chance Wihongi could not get to Chianese that received the ball and with a clinical finish he put the ball in the left low corner of Marinovic’s goal.

Phoenix managed to have the ball, but could not create real goalscoring chances in the first half. Glory always seemed to be dangerous in the counter-attack specially through Fornaroli. In the second half Phoenix was running against the clock to find at least an equaliser to send the game to extra-time. Long range shots from the Mexican Ulises Davila started to disturb Glory’s gloveman Liam Reddy, but the best opportunity of the game came from a great solo effort play by Callan Elliot that passed the ball back to the middle of the box, he found Jashua Sotirio that unfortunately send the ball away from the target.

The Nix pressed high, introduced Callum McCowatt and Alex Rufer in the game, but both New Zealand internationals could not connect with the front line of the team. The skills of Reno Piscopo were not enough for the Nix – the young Australian prospect made some impressive plays during the match, but none of them could not end up with a real chance for his side.

Davila had a last chance in a free-kick, but the Mexican wrongly decided to pass the ball to a teammate in the middle of the penalty box – the chance was once again wasted. The final result ended up being in favour of Perth – the club proceeds to the next stage as Phoenix one more time was unable to win an elimination final match.

Phoenix also lost in the last season in their first elimination final game against Melbourne Victory, being one more time unable to keep the dream alive to win their first ever A-League title. For the second time in a row the New Zealand-based club qualified for the A-League finals – showing a clear improvement of the club performance that was for a number of series away from the final stages of the top-tier league.