Keilor Park is taking care of its own backyard and maintaining the
pressure on other teams in the running for Football Federation Victoria
state league 2 north-west promotion.
The Parkers know they will need a favour or two from further
afield to keep their position in the top two at season’s end. In second
placed they have a three-point lead over third side Avondale Heights,
but the Heights have two catch-up games in hand to bridge the gap.
All the Parkers can do is keep accumulating the points – they did
that on Saturday with a 4-2 win over Preston Lions at the Keilor Park
Recreation Reserve.
“It’s going to go down to the wire so any points you get nowadays is crucial,” Parkers president Paul Portelli told the Weekly.
“We’ve got two more games left while the others have three or
four, so we’ve got to do our end of the job and wait on the other
results.
“It’s going to be an interesting finish.”
It was a pulsating end-to-end five-goal opening half on Saturday.
The Parkers opened the scoring after 10 minutes when Josh
Bruzzichessi put in a centimetre-perfect cross to find Michael Esposito
at the far post for a volleyed goal.
The Lions had a rapid fire reply, but Esposito’s second, a similar
volleyed goal on the back of a Sean Sacco cross, restored the lead for
the Parkers.
The Lions enjoyed a period of attack but the Parkers counter
attacked, with Atef El Dib chipping the goalkeeper to make it 3-1 after
25 minutes.
The Lions would again not be denied, reducing the deficit to one goal by half-time.
The Parkers would get the insurance goal they craved when Reno
Damianou was brought down in the box and Sacco stepped up to score from
the penalty spot.
Having played with weary legs following a mid-week fixture, the
Parkers were pleased to seal the game 20 minutes from time and avoid a
nervous finish.
