Walter Pless on Football

South Hobart were 3-0 up at half-time and eased off in the second period of this opening Group B clash in the Premier League section of the Summer Cup competition at KGV Park.

South hit the front midway through the opening half of this one-hour match when Metro keeper Troy Kaden was unable to hold David Abbott’s fierce long-range shot and Daniel Brown swooped to slam home the loose ball.

Brown might have had a second only a minute later when Tom Roach put him through, but his effort flew wide.

In the 16th minute, David Cooper, who had replaced the injured Adam Hedge moments earlier, made it 2-0 when he latched on to Jon Foley-Donoghue’s long ball out of defence and beat Kaden.

Metro were well and truly on the back foot and Cooper and Roach both went close before South netted their third from a penalty.

In the 23rd minute, Scott Bagorski cynically brought down Matthew Hill and Hugh Ludford easily beat Kaden with his spot-kick to make it 3-0.

Metro’s only real chance came two minutes after the resumption when Jarrod Saunders broke clear down the inside-left channel. The youngster had his knee heavily bandaged after missing most of last season and had injured it again last week in the northern pre-season Steve Hudson competition. It showed as he struggled to outpace the South defenders and his shot lacked power and drifted wide.

Six minutes later, Brown netted his second goal of the match to complete the scoring.

Cooper was carried off in the closing minutes after sustaining an ankle injury and being denied a penalty in the process.

Hedge, who suffered a recurrence of a groin strain and was replaced by Cooper early in the match, complained about the team being denied a decent warm-up period before the match.

South Hobart: Moncur, Sattler, Ludford, Beecroft, Lo, Brown, Roach, Hill, A Hedge, Foley-Donoghue, Abbott.

Interchange: Kruijver, Cooper, J Gasparinatos.

Goals: Brown 13, 38, Cooper 16, Ludford 23 pen.

Metro-Claremont: Kaden, Gasparin, Curran, Herring, S Kent, McKeown, Saunders, Hope, Bagorski, Dutton, Lipscombe.

Interchange: Dawes, Marney, Lawler, Cooke.

Referee: S Collins

Attendance: 200