A last-minute goal to Melrose has ended the cup finals run of Albury United, just a week after the latter was crowned league champions.
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The highs of last week were left in the past when Melrose’s Evan Rawluk scored at the death at Willow Park on Sunday to take his side to an upset 1-0 win.
The game of first versus eighth may have seemed easy to tip on paper, but Melrose coach, Chad Thomson, was not surprised his players came out on top.
In a disjointed season, Melrose had managed to get within one goal of the league champions during both their meetings this year.
“We knew if we played our best, we could get the win,” he said after the match.
“We always thought we were more a cup team.”
Thomson said he was especially happy to see the goal go in at the very end, as he did not want his sore players to go through 30 minutes of extra time.
The boys in purple now have their sights set on going all the way to the the Albury-Wodonga Football Association cup final.
Wangaratta City also sent a message to the competition with a resounding 5-1 win over Twin City Wanderers.
The teams went into half time locked at 1-1, before the Devils made an inspired substitution to change the game.
Regular reserves goalkeeper Hamish Busk went into goals to release Jon Shaw into the midfield and 10 minutes later, it was Shaw who headed the ball into the back of the net following a cross from Mark Waddington.
Twin City had made a promising start, with Jason Gilbert getting the first shot on target after 11 minutes, but 30 seconds later he went down after a head clash with Wangaratta’s Aaron Taylor.
Gilbert played on, but was eventually substituted at the 40-minute mark.
Cayne Wilhelm also went off five minutes into the second half with a leg injury following a collision with the goalkeeper.
Despite being without star midfielder Ryan Van Der Steeg, who missed after injuring his hamstring last week, Wangaratta controlled the game in the second half.
Set piece specialist, Stoycho Ivanov, put a couple of free kicks wide or over the crossbar, but when Frawley got his chance from a free kick, he put his left-foot shot straight into the top corner to give the goalkeeper no chance.
Adam Burchell also kicked his second goal and Ivo Madeira his first in the last five minutes of the match to seal the result.
In other matches, two goals to Matt Park and one to Lewis Holloway led Myrtleford to a 3-1 win over Albury City, and Pieter Noordewier, Frazer Trezise and Andrew Grove scored for Boomers in their big 3-0 win over Wodonga Diamonds.