Wellington Phoenix lament 'unacceptable' goal

BY FRED WOODCOCK

Wellington Phoenix coach Ricki Herbert is questioning Sydney FC's ethics and lamenting an "unacceptable" refereeing decision after Chris Payne was awarded a goal from a clear handball during last night's A-League match.

Sydney deservedly won the preliminary final 4-2 before a poor turnout of just 13,196 at the Sydney Football Stadium. They will meet the Melbourne Victory in next Saturday's grand final, while the Phoenix's season is over after a disappointing performance with a grand final spot on the line.

But the fallout from last night's match was dominated by Sydney's controversial second goal, which put them 2-1 up in the 30th minute.

Payne scored using his arm, lunging forward with his head to meet a free kick but blatantly putting the ball into the back of the net with his arm.

"It's dreadful, isn't it?," the usually mild-mannered Herbert said of referee Peter Green's decision to award the goal.

"Who is going to apologise for that? At the end of the day, it's not acceptable at this level of football.

"Irrespective of what the result might have been at the end of the day, I think it is poor.

"And I think for a player to do that is unacceptable as well."

Asked if he thought Payne should have owned up about the handball at the time, Herbert said: "You've got some comparisons around the world now, and that one is three times as bad.

"I don't know, as a club you've got to consider what your ethics are like and if you accept that, then so be it."

He said he hadn't sought clarification from Green.

"At the end of the day, what's he going to say? You can't get it any more obvious than that. It's not going to change it," Herbert said.

"It's not about the end result, Sydney's had a fantastic season, but for me it's about the incident and who is accountable for it? It's cost us."

Sydney coach Vitezslav Lavicka said he had not seen the incident but the team had spoken briefly about it in the changing room immediately after the game.

"He [Payne] said he missed the ball by head and played an unintentional handball. It's hard to say."

Asked how Payne was feeling about it, Lavicka said: "It was unintentional handball. He played good game, he scored two goals, second goal was controversial but I think it was unintentional."

Sydney's dynamic striker, Alex Brosque, leapt to Payne's defence.

"It all happens very quickly within a couple of split seconds but from where I was I couldn't tell if he did it on purpose. It seemed like he got a bit of a shove.

"It's unfortunate but we still got three other goals that were good."

Phoenix captain Andrew Durante, who challenged Payne for the ball, could not believe the goal was awarded.

"I went straight to the linesman. I knew 100 per cent it was handball. I spoke to the ref at halftime about it and he said it wasn't deliberate. It's pretty funny that one.

"Such a big game and such a big occasion, for something like that to change the game is very disappointing."

Phoenix striker Chris Greenacre said the goal changed the game. Instead of going into halftime level, they were forced to chase the game and gaps opened up.

"It just rips the heart out of you. We got back in the game with a good goal and that takes it away from you. It wasn't to be.

"I think we were right back in it. They played some good football but I thought we had withstood it OK. If we went into halftime [at 1-1] we were really confident we could get something out of it."

Though the goal had a big influence on the match, it certainly didn't decide it. The Phoenix were outgunned and outsmarted across the park, with Brosque and Mark Bridge, which each scored a goal, wreaking havoc with the Phoenix's defence for the fourth time this season.

"Throughout the year whoever has played up front has done reasonably well and it was good tonight again," Brosque said.

"Having Bridgey playing in that hole [behind the strikers] has been great, he stepped up a great deal since Steve [Corica] went out.

"I think we've been good on the counter attack all season and as a team we've defended well. When the opposition has got a lot of men forward that's when they're most vulnerable, and for us it's worked a lot of times this year."

He was at a loss to explain why Sydney had beaten the Phoenix four straight times this season, and never really looked threatened once.

"I guess there are some teams you tend to do well against more than others, and some you can't seem to beat," Brosque said.

"Gold Coast we couldn't beat all year but luckily enough Wellington we could. I don't know if there's a secret, I just think our game plan is a good one and it seemed to work all year. They found it tough against us."

- © Fairfax NZ News