Adelaide United 1-0 Western United
by Alyce Collett (27/4/25)
Above: Adelaide United celebrate Matilda McNamara’s winning goal. Photo: A-Leagues.
Adelaide United have created history, defeating Western United 1-0 in the Elimination Final to win their first ever A-League Women’s final.
After dominating early, Adelaide withstood relentless attacking from their visitors in the second half, and a first-half goal to Matilda McNamara was enough to get the job done for the home side.
The result sees Adelaide move on to face a two-legged semi-final against Melbourne Victory.
Adelaide did not take too long to get on the attacking front foot, with Emily Condon, Dylan Holmes, and Fiona Worts keeping the Western United defence on their toes from very early on.
Things did not get any easier for the visitors when Claudia Mihocic was forced from the field inside the opening 10 minutes because of an injury, and because of the makeup of the visitors’ bench, they were forced to shuffle a few players on field.
Kat Smith decided to bring on Kiewa Hieda instead of an actual defender in Aimee Medwin – perhaps to save her for later – and so was forced to push Isabella Dehakiz back into a defence role after she had started the game in a midfield one.
As the half progressed towards its own halfway point, Western United started to warm up and get into the game, and started to build up its minutes in its attacking third.
However, it would be the home side who hit the front with a goal in the 24th minute when McNamara headed home a Condon corner to give Adelaide the lead.
Despite the goal finally coming, it did not really skew the momentum in the home side’s favour, with both sides continuing to rack up attacking opportunities.
One thing that the first half had plenty of was injury interruptions. As well as Mihocic being forced from the field, Holmes copped a bloody nose after getting a ball straight to the face from close range, and Chloe Berryhill needed treatment on her knee after a heavy collision with Adelaide keeper Claudia Jenkins.
As such, the first half stoppage time was a whopping seven minutes, which was perfect for Western as it was the side with the attacking momentum as stoppage time approached.
The second half began much like the first half had ended, with Western United doing much of the attacking. However, no matter how hard they tried, they just could not find a way past the Adelaide defence and pick up a goal.
A big part of that momentum Western had was thanks to Berryhill, who continued to create plenty of chances for her side and was trying to keep her side’s belief high despite the frustrations of not being able to put the ball in the back of the net.
But the Adelaide defence – McNamara, Jenkins and Tiarna Karambasis most notably – continued to play tight defence and be well positioned on set pieces, and as such continued to deny their visitors again and again and again.
Western United will be coming away from particularly the second half left ruing what might have been. They had 15 shots in the second half compared to Adelaide’s three, yet only four of them were on target.
Teams: ADELAIDE UNITED (3-4-3): Jenkins, E.Hodgson, León, McNamara, Tonkin, Karambasis, Morgan, Dewey, Holmes, Condon, Worts. Substitutes: Dawber, I.Hodgson, Sasaki, Bowler, Healy, Melegh.
Scorer: McNamara 24’
WESTERN UNITED (4-1-4-1): Dall’oste, Sardo, Grove, Mihocic, Maher, Dehakiz, M Taranto, Eggesvik, A Taranto, Zimmerman, Berryhill. Substitutes: Lincoln, Medwin, De Domizio, Hieda, Ibargüen, Prakash.
Referee: Molly Godsell.
Attendance: 3,143.
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