Gallant Men Lose To Olympic

The Gambier Centrals Soccer Club's Senior Men's team put up a gallant fight against it's heavy-weight opponent Adelaide Olympic on Saturday 8th March at MGA Park.

It was always going to be a tough assignment, and the first 5 minutes of the match clearly showed that we were very much out classed, as Olympic moved the ball with precision and at lightning speed.

It took just 6 minutes for Joseph De Rosa to opening the scoring for the visitors.

A solid spell of defensive pressure kept Olympic at bay for almost a quarter of an hour but the tidal wave of attacks eventually broke through and Craig Shearer made it 2 on the 20 mark.

Alex Hill kept the Lions in the contest, when at full stretch, pulled up off the save of the night that was headed for the top corner.

The boys slowly started to find their feet and adjust to the pace of the game and after a great build up play, Alex Obedi found himself one on one with the Olympic keeper, who did enough to deny the young play maker.

Daniel Crossing was working hard in the forward half but on 44 minutes found himself in the referee's book, for the wrong reason, when he was shown a yellow card.

When the half time whistle blew, most people at the Den would have been happy to see Centrals only 2 down against our fancied opponents.

As the temperature cooled and the sun set, the evening became more bearable for the players and spectators.

Elder statesman, Brodey Koop was replaced at left back by Jasper Whitehead, who returned to the club after finishing university studies.

The half time team talk by coach Scott Dickson must have been inspirational as the lads came out firing in the second half.

Everybody lifted a gear and the midfield of Christian Fleetwood, Nico Teodoro and Meereh Htoo were on top and creating opportunities for Crossing and Sam Shoemark, while James Davey and Brad White shut down any attacks in the centre of the defence.

Whitehead and youngster, Pacifique Baraka were strong when challenged in the defensive backs, while calm and composed when going forward.

There was joy for the home team when Crossing found himself with space on the left hand side to run at the Olympic defence and calmly slotted home passed the out stretched finger tips of the Olympic keeper with 54 minutes on the clock.

There was hope in the crowd for an equaliser as Centrals kept applying pressure.

But when a dubious penalty was awarded for Olympic, that hope turned to despair, only for Alex Hill to step up and save to his left to deny Olympic captain Jordan Pudlar.

Olympic Coach, Rick Cerracchio, swung the changes, making 3 substitutions and the reconfiguration worked a treat as simple defensive errors cost Centrals 3 goals in four minutes to kill the game, with Alex Demasi scoring a brace and Marko Bogdanovic also getting on the scoresheet.

Frustrations boiled over for Crossing when he voiced his concerns to the referee about being unfairly treated and ended up receiving an early shower when shown a second yellow card at the 85th minute.

Final score saw Olympic came away with a 5 - 1 victory and progress to the next stages of the Australia Cup competition.

After all is said and done, there were some very promising signs for what the season lies ahead, considering we were missing several potential starting players and our opposition was of a very high standard.

We thank Adelaide Olympic for travelling to Mount Gambier and hope they managed to get something out of the game and had an enjoyable trip at the same time. We wish them all the best in their endeavours to get back into the National Premier League in season 2026.