Melbourne City 3-0 Taichung Blue Whale
By Emma Burke at AAMI Park (23/3/25)
Above: Taylor Otto (left) and Rebekah Stott. Photo: Melbourne City
Melbourne City have cruised through to the Asian Women’s Champions League Semi-Finals after defeating Taichung Blue Whale 3-0 at Melbourne Rectangular Stadium.
City opened the scoring through a corner play that ended in Mariana Speckmaier sending the ball careening into the roof of the net.
Their lead was doubled by an own goal just before the end of the first half, when Holly McNamara’s cross into the box took an unfortunate deflection off both defender Pei-Jung Li, and goalkeeper Ming-Jung Tsai.
The second half saw the game open up more, with Taichung looking to press higher on City’s backline.
Despite this, City found another goal from a penalty won and converted by Holly McNamara. McNamara was taken down in the box by Taichung’s keeper, and then from the spot delivered the ball hard and fast into the far right corner.
In a moment just after play restarted, McNamara ended up on the pitch clutching at her right knee, a potential cause for concern given that she has had three ACL reconstructions in her short playing career, but she was able to leave the pitch by herself, and was seen after the final whistle in good spirits and moving freely.
Their next clear goal-scoring opportunity came when substitute Emilia Murray was also taken down in the box by the keeper, however this time the spot kick taken by Leticia McKenna was sent almost directly at the keeper, and she was unable to convert on a second attempt.
This win sees City head into a centralised hub alongside the other three teams remaining to play out their semi-final against Incheon Red Angels from Korea Republic before the grand final, with a location to soon be finalised.
Impetus had photographers Adrian Geremaia and Beck Hartley at AAMI Park – go to our Instagram page (@ImpetusFootball) to see their exclusive photo galleries for us.
Teams: MELBOURNE CITY (4-2-3-1): Mieres, Apostolakis, Stott, Otto, Roestbakken, Hughes, McKenna, Bosch, Pollicina, Speckmaier, McNamara. Substitutions: McMahon, Vlajnic, Henry, Murray, Karic, Rossi, Barbieri, Varley, Accardo, Davidson, Myers
Scorers: Speckmaier 4’, Li 43’ (OG), McNamara 63’ (pen).
TAICHUNG BLUE WHALE (5-4-1): Tsai, Huang, Tanaka, Li, Chang, Peng-Ngam, J. Chen, Intamee, Lin, Sornsai, Y. Chen. Substitutes: Y. S. Lin, J. X. Lin, C. Y. Liu, C. Y. Nien, Y. C. Pan
Referee: Kim Yu Jeong.
Crowd: 1,865.
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