Hills Brumbies made the trip east from the Hills district, quietly confident after a fine victory over Sydney University on Saturday night. They would have been wary of Dunbar Rovers, an unknown factor at NPL3 level. Still no captain Robbie Deasy, who for the second year in a row has struggled with injury around FFA Cup time, no Clive Delaney and no Neil O’Sullivan – both out with dodgy Irish backs. One change from Sunday’s fine win at Magdala – Stephen Liu made everyone realise that we were not professional footballers when he had to pull out due to a last minute work deadline. Alex Nicolosi came into the starting lineup with Robbie Ezekiel going to left back.

Our boys got off to the perfect start. After some neat quick passing, the ball got worked out to Mike Sealy on the left side of the penalty area and he smashed a first time shot past the Hills keeper to give Dunbar an early 1-0 lead. The crowd were buoyant. They had barely time to take their seats in the Hensley grandstand and we were ahead. We continued to dominate for most of the rest of the half – every player was on their game.

A few minutes before half time, Dunbar scored the goal of the match. After winning a one on one challenge, right back Alex Euripidou used all his speed and power to race clear of all Brumbies, played a great ball with the outside of his right foot to mate Alex Nicolosi, who played the perfect first time pass into the path of Mike Sealy who timed his run to perfection as the Brumbies defenders pushed out to try to get him offside. The pass was so perfect in fact, that Sealy only needed to take one touch – and that was to bury it into the right corner of the net. An absolute beauty! 2-0 at half-time and Dunbar Rovers were cruising.

Normal service was resumed immediately after the restart and Sealy had a glorious chance to complete his hattrick but couldn’t hit the target. We continued to be well in control of the game at 2-0 up. Suddenly we switched off completely – started doing some strange things at the back, got away with one or two mistakes but then got punished clinically by Hills to make it 2-1. Game on. Suddenly the Hensley grandstand was not quite so cock-a-hoop. Even the ground announcement of the opponents goal was subdued. There was a worried look on faces. Could we be about to throw it away? For about a 15 minute period, the game was pretty even but it was down to Man of the Match Robbie Ezekiel to put the result beyond doubt when his vicious left footed corner kick evaded everyone and hit the corner of the net. Relief from everyone at Dunbar. 3-1.

Soon after, Brumbies had a man dismissed for a second yellow card and the contest was pretty much over. Sean Burke put the icing on the cake when he scampered through and when he suddenly realised he was one and one with the keeper, calmly slotted home. The game ended 4-1 to Dunbar and our crowd was in raptures! Comprehensive victory in the end, with a little bit of a speed bump along the way – but a fantastic performance that Head Coach Will Cullen was absolutely delighted with in the post-match interview.

It was a great lesson in how to play football for all the young, new Dunbar Rovers players from Under 13s to Under 20s in the grandstand. The club thanks everyone for showing up on the night and we would like to invite everyone back when a massive club Bonnyrigg White Eagles comes to Hensley in around two weeks time for the Westfield FFA Cup Round 5 clash.

Westfield FFA Cup – Round 4
Dunbar Rovers FC 4-1 Hills Brumbies FC
Hensley Athletic Field
Eastgardens
Wed Apr 6

LINEUP
S.Deasy – Euridipidou, Smith ©, Simpson, Ezekiel – Doddy, Burke, Miller – Sealy, Green, Nicolosi
Subs: Mrva for Miller, Hems for Doddy, Desmond for Nicolosi.
Naoum, Swartz (both unused).

MAN OF THE MATCH: Robbie Ezekiel.