Sydney FC 2-1 Wellington Phoenix
By Emma Burke 15/3/25
Above: Sydney FC players celebrating the late winning goal. Photo: Sydney FC
Sydney FC have scraped themselves off the bottom of the table after Princess Ibini’s 98th minute goal secured them the 2-1 win against Wellington Phoenix at Leichhardt Oval.
Maddie Caspers, who also celebrated her 18th birthday today, opened the scoring after finding herself on the end of a cross from Abbey Lemon that had missed Mackenzie Hawkesby in the middle of the box.
Caspers gift was wrapped up neatly for her when the defender in front of her, Tiana Jaber, slipped over at the most inopportune time, allowing Caspers to slot the ball home past Phoenix keeper Carolina Vilao.
The Phoenix had plenty of chances to find the back of the next, but had nearly every shot on target thwarted by an excellent shift between the sticks by 18 year old keeper Jasmine Black.
When Wellington did finally find their equaliser, late in the second half, it was through a pin-point through ball from Captain Annalie Longo, to reach Manaia Elliot who was making a well timed run into the box.
With the scoreboard tied at a goal apiece, it was looking like this game would end in a draw, but a second yellow card to Jaber saw Wellington go down to 10 players with five minutes left in regular time.
While some teams have managed to see out a draw or even secure a win with 10 on the pitch, this was not the case for the Wellington Phoenix, who crumbled under both the pressure and speed of Sydney’s crucial substitution in Princess Ibini.
Ibini’s goal in the dying seconds of additional time came about through a clever one-two with Lemon, allowing Ibini the time and space to position herself to take a curling shot that passed Vilao in Wellington’s goal.
This result puts Sydney FC in 11th place on the table, just one point ahead of their cross-town rivals, Western Sydney, and leaves Wellington Phoenix in 8th place with only four games left of the season to try and secure a place in the finals.
Check out our Instagram feed @ImpetusFootball to see photo galleries from the game by Impetus’ Kris Goman and Ryan Miller-Woods
Teams: SYDNEY FC (4-2-3-1): Black, Tumeth, Thompson, Tobin, Lemon, Hollman, Johnson, Tallon-Henniker, Dos Santos, Caspers, Hawkesby Substitutions: Connors, Farrow, Ibini, Mason-Jones, Bryson
Scorers: Caspers 45+4’, Ibini 90+8’
WELLINGTON PHIENIX (4-4-2): Vilao, Wall, Jaber, Kelly, Elliot, Brazendale, McCutcheon, Longo, Main, Fergusson, Whinham Substitutes: McMeeken, Jale, Tanaka, Ingham, Neary
Scorers: Elliot 74’
Referee: Mikayla Ryan
Attendance: 1,507.
Follow Impetus on social media –
Twitter (X): @impetusfootball TikTok: @impetusfootball
Instagram: @impetusfootball
impetusfootball.org 