In what will be a tough Greek battle, Northcote City and South Melbourne will meet on Sunday in a preliminary final, vying to secure their spot in the VPL Grand Final against Bentleigh at AAMI Park.

Not many could have predicted this exciting end of the season – after loosing to Bentleigh Greens 2-1 after extra time in last weekend’s semi finals, minor premier Northcote City is now vying for the Grand Finals opportunity that seemed guaranteed in those days of the season when the league’s leader was untouchable and sat nine points ahead of others.

In the southern-eastern suburb of Bentleigh, victory against the Hercules Boys boosted coach John Anastasiadis’ confidence that his side will be able to overcome whoever they meet in the Grand Final next Saturday. The big success of Anastasiadis’ boys doesn’t come as much of surprise, as they have shown continuous qualities throughout the season.

Former Socceroo Goran Lozanovski’s side was unrivaled by any other side this season. However, after a not-so-good second half of the season and a loss to Bentleigh in the semi-final last week, the minor premier finds itself with pressure on its shoulders to secure the Grand Final spot.

In another semi-final played last weekend, South Melbourne saw a crowd of close to 5,000 VPL followers enter the stands for the historic derby with Melbourne Knights, in what was another clean sheet game to make the former Dandenong Thunder coach Chris Taylor proud.

After a 1-0 win against Green Gully in the elimination final and Melbourne Knights last weekend, it seems that South Melbourne can make a turnaround at the end of this VPL season. For South Melbourne, the Sunday encounter will be their first preliminary final in VPL since 2005.

Speaking to Neos Kosmos, coach Chris Taylor says getting into the preliminary finals in the last minutes is astounding for club that suffered from quite a turbulent season.
After warning that South Melbourne would be the side that “nobody wants to play” in the finals, Taylor has proven himself correct – South Melbourne remains as the only team to have not conceded a goal in the finals.

“To be quite frank with you, coming in half way through the season, where a lot of changes have taken place, I wasn’t expecting too much – other than to work out which players in the squad I was going to keep for the following season. The team probably exceeded my expectations and the club’s expectations as well. What we achieved so far is very positive for the club and for the future outlook,” Taylor told Neos Kosmos.

After joining the club mid-season, Taylor admitted that finals for him were not even a consideration.

“You are going to every game and you want to win every game. But realistically, finals were not even a consideration. We were trying to get some sort of fluency in the way we played football. To actually make the finals, it has been pretty much cut-throats all the way through. To achieve what we have done has been a rare achievement; it’s exceeded all our expectations.”

With his side only one victory away from Grand Final at AAMI Park, South Melbourne head coach said his team will enter the match with less pressure than their opponents.

“Northcote has had a wonderful season, and they would obviously feel very disappointed not to play Grand Final. We are on a bit of a crest of a wave, and whatever comes along we’ll take. There is a little bit less pressure on us, and more on Northcote. But every game is a battle where we are up to win it to go through, so its basically do-or-die for both clubs,” he said.

With only Northcote City separating his side from the final’s day, Taylor can’t forget the strengths his opponents displayed throughout the whole season.
“They have been a very cohesive unit, as a team. They defended very well, but they were also capable of scoring goals with Lujic in the front. They are very compact unit, they work hard for each other, and that’s probably the backbone of their team. We know they’re going to go out there and compete very very hard, and we are up to be able to match them for that.”

Nursing through three injuries in his team, Chris Taylor will make his final decision on who will be the starting line-up for the Sunday battle.
South Melbourne will face Northcote City in the preliminary final on Sunday 13 October, at 3:00 pm at JL Murphy Reserve – SS Anderson Reserve, Plummer St, Port Melbourne.

*Note that due to the Melbourne Marathon Festival there will be several road closures. If you are travelling from the south, use Princes Highway (Dandenong Road) to access Port Melbourne and allow extra travel time.