Wellington Phoenix 7 – Sydney FC 0
By Alyce Collett 20/12/2025
Above: Grace Jale (centre) celebrates after scoring one of the two goals she scored against Sydney FC. Photo: Ryan Imray for Impetus
The Wellington Phoenix have recorded a monster historic win this afternoon, downing Sydney FC 7-0 to not only record their biggest ever win but hand Sydney FC its biggest ever loss. The Phoenix were in control all afternoon, and goals from Manaia Elliott, Samba Bhandari and Grace Jale, as well as own goals from Tori Tumeth and Sarah Hunter, saw the home side bank the historic scoreline.
After a little bit of a frantic start, it did not even take Wellington even three minutes to get their scoring started. After the initial shot was well saved by Tiarna Robertson, some poor marking of Elliot from the Sydney defence allowed the Phoenix attacker to pounce on the deflection and tap it home into the back of the net.
Pia Vlok went millimetres from doubling Wellington’s lead not even two minutes later, but instead hit the crossbar.
Even with only one goal on the board, momentum was very much in the yellow corner. The Phoenix players had a lot more energy all over the park – particularly from players like CJ Bott, Emma Main and Brooke Nunn – whereas the Sky Blues was just fighting for their lives, doing everything they can to keep the ball out of their defensive net. Riley Tanner was trying hard to generate something out on the left wing for Sydney, but with no one else lifting to her level her efforts were often in vain.
Wellington’s second goal came about 10 minutes after its first when Bhandari found herself at the back post and at the end of a perfectly placed Nunn corner, which she then headed home for her first goal in Phoenix colours.
One intriguing thing about the way the match was playing out, even from early on, was that despite Wellington having less players in its back line compared to Sydney’s, the Phoenix defenders were the more effective back line. Wellington’s defenders were positioning themselves better than Sydney’s and were more alert to everything, which meant the home side’s defenders were able to neutralise any attacking threats coming their way more effectively than Sydney’s.
Things did calm down during the middle period of the half, but as the half progressed towards its final stages it was clear that Wellington were far from done on the scoring front, scoring one more goal before half time.
Wellington had a corner that bounced around off several players as it landed in the box, but it eventually landed at Jale’s feet, who smashed it into the back of the net for her first goal of the season and Wellington’s 100th of its history.
The half time stats were as intriguing as they were at times stark.
Wellington had 12 more shots on goal than Sydney did (and four more than Sydney that were on target), had 18% more of the possession and had more than double the final third entries that Sydney did.
Despite the home side’s dominance in the first half, the second half was even more painful for Sydney than the first half was.
Jale’s second goal of the match – which took her to equal top goal scorer in club history – was another example of Sydney’s shortcomings from set pieces, after Jale found herself on the end of a perfectly placed corner from Main and then headed it straight into the back of the net.
Goal number five came from Bhandari, who after being fed a through ball perfectly from Nunn, guided the ball perfectly around Robertson and into the back of the net.
As if already being 5-0 down was not bad enough, Sydney added to its own pain by conceding two own goals in the final 10 minutes of the match.
The first one was off Tumeth, who was trying to clear the ball but mistimed it and it was a deflection into the back of the net, while the second one was perhaps the most chaotic one of the match, but ultimately bounced off Hunter.
Teams: WELLINGTON PHOENIX (3-5-3): Esson, Bott, Barry, Walker, Jale, Samba, Elliot, Van der Meer, Main, Nunn, Vlok. Substitutes: Danieli, Leon, D. Brazendale, Wall, Benson, Bartlett.
Scorers: Elliott 3’, Bhandari 13’, 69’, Jale 36’, 54’, Tumeth 80’ (OG), Hunter 90’ (OG).
SYDNEY FC (4-3-3): Robertson, Tumeth, Fenton, Ayson, Sullivan, Hunter, Lowry, Galic, Ulkekul, Hawkesby, Tanner. Substitutes: Hinz,Cassar, Lemon, Halmarick, Tallon-Henniker, Caspers.
Referee: Sarah Jones.
Attendance: TBC.
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