Ramon Falzon’s first game as Green Gully coach ended in a heartbreaking 1-1 draw on Saturday afternoon, after conceding a last ditch equaliser in their road trip against Manningham United at Pettys Reserve.
Gully led for the majority of the contest after Mohamed Adam opened the scoring, and it looked as if the visitors were on track for the perfect start to Falzon’s tenure.
However, Junya Kada struck in the dying moments to salvage a much-needed point for the home side.
The result dents Gully’s chances of making a late push for finals football in the second-half of the campaign, sitting 12 points behind sixth placed Port Melbourne Sharks with 10 games to play.
Meanwhile, the draw saw Manningham get their first points in almost two months and maintain their three point gap above the relegation zone.
Falzon made four changes to the starting lineup from the side that lost against Hume a week before, bringing in goalkeeper Liam Driscoll, Justin Spiteri, Adolph Koudakpo and Gianlucca Ianucci for Reef Murfet, Eilon Kifle and suspended duo Luca Tevere and Jamie Latham.
Adam started the game strongly in attack, hitting the woodwork twice in a matter of moments, before finally getting his goal in the 17th minute to open the scoring.
A beautiful bit of team play from Shifa Ahmed and Koudakpo, found the unmarked attacker who rolled the ball into the back of the net to give Gully the lead.
Despite Gully’s dominance, Manningham showed their ability to cause problems in attack through Ben Everson who came close to an equaliser, but he dragged his effort wide of the mark.
Gully had a great chance to take the lead before half-time, when Koudakpo had his header well saved by George Tzamouranis, before Taylor Schrijvers smashed an effort over the crossbar moments later.
After half-time, Gully continued to pressure the Manningham goal with Matthew Crooks smashing a long range effort just wide of the mark.
As Gully looked to preserve the win, the contest flipped into Manningham’s control late in the game and Liam Driscoll had to react quickly to deny Christos Theodorakopoulos an equaliser.
Back the other way, Ahmed had a great chance to wrap up the three points after dancing his way around a number of Manningham defenders before blasting wide.
And from the resulting goal-kick, Manningham won a corner which led to a last second equaliser from Kada who nodded home Theodorakopoulos’ corner.
Gully are back in action this Saturday at home when they take on Heidelberg United as they look for their first win under Falzon.
