ESSENDON
Before a ball was kicked on Saturday, Cross Keys stood still. Both squads linked arms along the halfway line for a minute’s silence in memory of Dragan Ristevski, and the loudest ground in the NPLW said everything by saying nothing at all. When the football finally started, the Royals women spent the next ninety minutes honouring the occasion the best way a team can, by playing like the afternoon mattered.
It finished 6-0, and the scoreline was not flattering. The Royals had 22 shots to nine and put 17 of them on target, which is the kind of number that usually belongs to a training drill rather than a round 22 fixture against a side that had scored 35 goals this season. Victory came to Cross Keys with genuine attacking pedigree and left without a goal to show for it, because the back line and the goalkeeper gave them absolutely nothing worth keeping.
For a long time it was a familiar kind of frustrating. Akeisha Sandhu opened the scoring midway through the first half, scoring an incredible free-kick from the wing. And despite wave after wave of red shirts the first half ended 1-0.. Anyone who has watched football knows how those afternoons can turn sour, and at the break the game was still, technically, alive.
Then came the half hour that ended the contest and probably improved the goal difference column for the rest of the season. Maggie Jenkins tapped in from close range 59 minutes and found the net, Kelli McGroarty forced home the third four minutes later from another set piece, and on 69 minutes Sandhu produced another fine goal fro range, floated up and over the keeper and in. When your attacking fullback is scoring goals like that, things are going well. Paige Kingston-Hogg, on as a substitute, made it five with a composed finish on 80 minutes, and McGroarty capped it at the far post o with three minutes left.
Five goals in 28 second-half minutes, from five different situations, with the two late ones scored while Victory were still chasing the game’s first sign of mercy.
Coach Jaiden van der Heijden was not interested in overselling it afterwards. He called it far from the prettiest performance of the season, and then pointed at the only numbers that matter, because to score six and concede none at this stage of the year is a rewarding afternoon no matter how it looks. Sandhu was more direct about what the goals were for. The group wants goal difference in the bank for the final series, and confidence in the legs for what comes next.
What comes next is the biggest week in the club’s recent history.
The win keeps the Royals second on the NPLW ladder with 47 points and four rounds to play, right in the thick of a title race that will not be decided until the very end.
But before the league resumes, there is the small matter of next Saturday, the club’s first Nike F.C. Cup final.
The support at the semi-final against Bulleen made a real difference, and the players have asked for one thing this week, as much red at the final as the club can muster.
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