Friday night football at Jets Park is back on the menu this season thanks to Modbury’s unsuccessful 2011 Super League campaign which saw them finish bottom and be relegated to the Premier League for 2012.
The Jets came into their round 5 encounter with Adelaide Olympic FC, sitting top of the Premier League table with three wins and a draw to be four points clear of Olympic. As has been customary so far this season, the blue-and-whites have not lost a game when scoring within the first five minutes and Modbury were put on the back foot as early as the second minute.
Striker Matthew Dimopoulos pressured the Jets defence to kick the ball out for a throw-in deep inside Olympics attacking third and from the resulting throw, Xhoel Gjomakaj delivered a teasing cross which saw Modbury custodian Paul Reilly come out and completely miss his punch only to allow a free Bruce Kamau on the back post to smartly chest and volley the ball onto the underside of the crossbar and into the net.
Olympics counter attack game plan had Modbury frustrated and vulnerable for the best part of the first half and two brilliant saves from captain Matthew Milosevic in the 26th and 38th minutes denied Modbury of it’s best two opportunities.
Olympic again exposed the Jets on the counter in the 45th minute when 15-year-old Nathan Konstandopoulos (son of former NSL star and West Adelaide legend George Konstandopoulos) switched a lovely ball wide to Gjomakaj who found Jovanovic surrounded by three Jets defenders to work his way past all of them with some fancy footwork, then lay off a nice ball to Dimopoulos whose first time cracking left shot rattled the upright and virtually rolled along the goal line and finally out for a goal kick in the last play of the half.
The second period saw Olympic sitting deep and inviting the Jets to attack, however Olympic’s solid back four led by veteran Carl Robinson and the strong Agalidis, forced Modbury with no other option but long range shooting. Twice they looked so close to an equaliser only to again be denied by the brilliance of captain courageous Milosevic in the Olympic goal.
The entertaining game also had a controversial penalty decision into stoppage time (in the 95th minute) the referee gave a penalty for deliberate handball against Olympic defender Frank Pantsaras after the ball had spilled from a Modbury corner into the path of Jets goal sneak Shane Pearce whose half volley hit Pantsaras’ upper arm from two yards. Fierce remonstration from the Olympic players was to no avail and Pearce himself stepped up to send Milosevic the wrong way and give Modbury shared honours for the evening while Olympics’ players were left shattered in the middle of the ground after the game with the empty feeling usually experienced by losing grand finalists.
