This weekend could not have been more perfect for the Central Coast Mariners Women's and Men's sides with both getting maximum points from away matches.
The weekend started with the women on Saturday travelling to Brisbane to play the Roar at Ballymore.
The game for the most part was a scrappy affair played in hot conditionsd but the Mariner's women made the best of two opportunities that were literally either side of half-time. Both opportunities were created by Annabel Martin who urguably had her best game of the season.
The first goal came on the stroke of the 45 minute mark when Martin received the ball wide on the left and put in a wicked cross into the Roar penalty box. The ball floated over all players except for Wurigumula who managed to get her right boot to the ball to direct it past the Roar goalkeeper.
The second goal was scored in the first minute of the second half.
From the kick-off, the Mariners drove forward for a Golec long-range shot to be well saved by the Roar goalkeeper. However from the resulting corner, the Brisbane defence failed to clear the ball with Martin pouncing onto a loose pass by Brisbane in their own penalty box. Martin cut the ball back towards the penalty spot where Mariner's attacker Rola Badawiya stepped over the ball leaving it for Kyah Simon who drilled the ball into the back of the net.
This win placed the Mariner's Women into second place on the Liberty A-League ladder and will hopefully stay there depending upon other results later in the weekend.
The good results continued on Sunday with the Mariner's Men playing Macarthur in Sydney coming away with a 3-0 result.
The game was only 8 minutes old when Josh Nisbet scored his second goal in consecutive games. Ironically, the goal was an almost exact repeat of the goal he scored in Newcastle last weekend. Mikael Doka passed the ball across the top of the penalty box which Nisbet controlled, turned and struck it into the top left corner.
11 minutes later it was Nisbet's turn to be provider. He placed a perfect through ball which Barcellos collected, beat the Macarthur defence and scored past the Bulls goalkeeper into the bottom left corner. This was to remain the score to half-time.
Macarthur initially seemed to come into the second half a bit more invigorated but the Mariners had a chance to score again when a penalty was awarded in 2nd minute of the second half. Unfortunately for the Mariners the Macarthur goalkeeper picked the right way to go and saved the penalty.
It wasn't long before the Mariner's travelling fans got to witness the goal of the game in the 55th minute. After some Macarthur pressure on the Mariners defence in the form of three corners, the ball found Josh Nisbet who calmly took control of the ball at the top of the Mariners penalty box. Nisbet placed a perfect square pass to Doka who was on the move and ran the ball up the right into the Macarthur half.
Like Nisbet, Doka placed a perfect cross field pass to Ryan Edmondson whose first time strike resulted in the curling shot going into the top right corner to make it 3-0 and his first A-League goal in Mariners colours.
Given that previous league leaders Wellington lost to Melbourne City earlier in the weekend, this win now places the Mariner's Men at the top of the Isuzu Ute A-League ladder.
Next games for the Mariners teams are:
- Mariner's Women play Canberra United at Industree Group Stadium in Gosford on Sunday, 17th March with kick-off at 2:15pm.
- Mariner's Men have AFC commitments and with the International break their next A-League game is on Saturday, 30th March with kick-off at 7:45pm.