A hard-working Newcastle Jets made a promising start to the season when they took their first ever points off league heavyweights Melbourne City in an exciting 1-1 draw at No.2 Sportsground on Sunday.
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The Jets have no big-name players nor any imports this season and were predicted to be well off the pace of finals football before a ball had even been kicked.
But in front of a 1523-strong home crowd on Sunday, Newcastle matched it with the might of the three-time W-League champions and came close to pulling off an upset at the death.
Jets coach Craig Deans described the result as a "starting point" for his mostly home-grown squad.
"We wanted to get something out of the game; we obviously didn't want to lose and I thought we had enough chances to win," Deans said.
"I thought it was a good game, pretty exciting, and for us just really positive, and the most important thing is it gives the confidence to the girls to know they can play against anyone and more than hold their own."
City's starting line-up included Matildas players Lydia Williams, Steph Catley, Ellie Carpenter, Emma Checker and Emily van Egmond.
They also featured internationals Claire Emslie (Scotland), Yukari Kinga (Japan) and Milica Mijatovic (Serbia) as well as former Jet and Merewether Herald Women's Premier League player Rhali Dobson.
In seven previous encounter since City joined the league, Newcastle had never beaten the three-time champions.
It was billed as a David versus Goliath match and the Jets took it to the league giants, at times looking the stronger side.
The hosts were the first to strike when eventual goalscorer Teigan Collister broke down the right wing at pace in the seventh minute and delivered a cross into the box to find Jenna Kingsley, who put a shot wide of the goals.
Five minutes later, Jets midfielder Libby Copus-Brown, who was among the best on park on Sunday, had a long-range shot wrapped up by City goalkeeper Williams.
But it was van Egmond, who left the Jets to join City this season, who broke the deadlock when she buried a long-range shot into the bottom left corner in the 22nd minute. The ball was laid back from City striker Emslie for the advancing W-League veteran and long-serving Matilda to fire into the net.
Newcastle finished the half looking the more likely with Kingsley, Tara Andrews and Gema Simon all having chances to score without success.
The second half was an arm wrestle. Catley hit the right post with a long-range shot in the 65th minute before the Jets found the equaliser through Collister two minutes later.
Newcastle counter-attacked through Jenna Kingsley down the left. Her ball into the box took a deflection from a City defender and fell to Collister, who took a touch before unleashing a right-footed rocket into the top right corner to the delight of the vocal Novocastrian crowd.
Nicki Flannery hit the post from close range off a corner in the 72nd, Andrews put one wide with Williams off her line in the 82nd and Kingsley had an injury-time shot saved.
In all, the Jets showed they cannot be written off this season with some steely defence across the park, exciting attacking and a tireless performance.
"Everyone wants to play finals ... it's going to be very, very hard because we don't have what these guys [City] have in terms of name players," Deans said post-match on Sunday night.
"But we've got a good work ethic and they listen to instructions tactically and they followed them really well today. I hate saying things like this, but we just have to take it game by game ... It's been a positive experience today and we want to make sure we don't just stop now. We want to keep going."
Kahibah junior Lauren Allan, who was signed by the Jets after starring alongside Andrews for New Lambton in the WPL this season, made her W-League debut when she replaced Collister for the final 16 minutes against City.
Newcastle travel to Bankwest Stadium on Friday to play Western Sydney in round two. The Wanderers won their round-one match 2-1 against Adeliade last Thursday night.
