A three goal second half saw Canberra United storm home to a win against Melbourne Victory to reclaim second place on Ninja A-League Women’s ladder, after initially being a goal down.
United were boosted by the returns of Nanako Sasaki from an ankle injury and Tegan Bertolissio from suspension. Their quality on return was evident as Sasaki was on hand to breakdown the opposition attack in the middle of the park, while Bertolissio used her strength in the backline to repel anything that came close to goal.
Bethany Gordon continued her run of fine form, with a handful of early freekicks causing problems for the victory defence.
Sasha Grove and Josie Aulicino had golden opportunities to open the scoring but were denied by high quality goalkeeping from Courtney Newbon in the Victory goal.
United continued to dominate the match with chances aplenty, but were continuously denied by Newbon.
With just over ten minutes remaining in the half, United were given a boost as the referee showed Victory defender Claudia Bunge a straight red card for denying an obvious goalscoring opportunity.
United came out firing in the second half, continuing their dominance, but were unlucky to fall behind as Kennedy White opened the scoring for the visitors on the counter.
Emma Hawkins was presented with a chance to equalise from point blank range but a last-ditch effort from Kayla Morrisson pushed her effort on to the crossbar and away from danger.
It took United until just after the hour mark to find the back of the net after consistently getting shots on goal.
Grove got the scoring started for United, getting on the of a rebounded shot from Aulicino and blasting it home to level the scores.
Minutes later, and with her first touch of the game, Mary Stanic-Floody came on and scored a stunning long-range goal into the top right corner with Newbon no chance of saving.
With just under 15 minutes of play remaining, a corner from Emma Robers found Tegan Bertolissio at the back post, with the Young Matildas defender nodding home for her fist professional goal, to seal the three points.
As had been the case for the majority of the game, United controlled the remaining minutes to take all three points and go up to second on the ladder.
