Five years after he decided one Sydney derby, Milos Ninkovic returned to haunt his former club Sydney FC and provide the single point of inspiration, writes Tom Smithies.
He would not be denied.
Just when it seemed that Milos Ninkovic had stumbled at the point when he could have made history, the city-crossing Serb found a way to change the script and once again decide how the derby would be celebrated.
It just had to be him. The player synonymous with Sydney FC for so long returned to haunt them in the most pointed way, setting up the winner for the Wanderers as if to show his former club why he felt so slighted at the way their relationship ended.
On a tumultuous night at Allianz Stadium, the atmosphere crackling over and around a crowd more than 35,000, it was Ninkovic who found a nano-second of calm in one of the most emotional weeks of his decorated career and tipped the scales towards the red and black.
Moments after he fluffed the opportunity to score himself, Ninkovic laid on a gilt-edged chance for Kusini Yengi and the die was cast. The Wanderers go into the World Cup break in second place, that statistic burnished by the unalloyed joy of winning a derby in enemy territory.
Five years ago Nikovic broke Western Sydney hearts with a last-minute winner in the derby, just one of a litany of glorious moments in his storied spell in the Sky Blue of Sydney.
But here he was wearing red and black after his dramatic fall-out with Sydney opened the door for a move across town to their rivals. The defection had dominated the headlines, and in the end his match-winning assist was the kind of riposte of which Ninkovic might have dreamed.
Predictably he was a hunted man from the start – booed when he emerged for the warm-up, bood at every touch, and clattered to the floor three times in the opening 90 seconds.
It felt like the start of a heavyweight contest, but instead the two sides became entangled in each other. Chances were as precious as hen’s teeth, amid Western Sydney’s determination to nullify the attacking threats that Sydney have invested so much into this year.
The tempo simmered rather than boiled, and it was hard to say who had the edge – until the Wanderers found two glittering opportunities and turned one into the decisive blow.
Ninkovic could have scored the winner himself – he should have done, and for minutes after that lost opportunity must have gnawed at his conscience.
The chance was unimprovable, the sort of which he might have imagined amid the angsty, tension-infused build-up to this game.
The worst bit was that it was more or less the game’s first clear chance, after an arm wrestle of a contest where every focus was on preventing the opposition from gaining a foothold.
As a Sydney move broke down Western Sydney raced down the right and Sulejman Krpic’s pass inside was astute – Ninkovic, classically, had landed in a pocket of space unnoticed. With two touches he was in front of Sydney’s goal, ready to take the ultimate revenge on the club he felt had turned its back on a legend.
Maybe subconsciously he couldn’t do it, or maybe he just stumbled. In a moment his tame, stabbed shot had been smothered by Andrew Redmayne and the chance was gone. It felt like a turning point, but Ninkovic had other ideas.
What unfolded showed the critical importance of decision-making at crucial points of a game like this with the stakes so high. Buoyed by the escape Sydey pressed forward and suddenly had an advantage of numbers as Robert Mak ran at the Wanderers defenders. With options to either side, most notably Joe Lolley screaming and unmarked on his right, Mak chose to shoot, straight at the nearest defender.
As the ball rebounded the transition was brutal in response. One pass forward had the ball at the feet of Ninkovic as he sprinted through the lines of Sydney players, and played a weighted ball into the run of Yengi. Two touches drove Yengi into the heart of the Sydney box and his finish was way too powerful for Redmayne.
Sydney pressed and pressed again as they sought a response, but almost everythng ran aground on the Wanderers’ defensive masses. When the goal did gape, Adrian Segecic blazed over. They had nothing left.
Sydney now have awkward and urgent converdations to have while the A-League is in World Cup hibernation. They have so many good players and so far not nearly enough cohesion. Their season feels at a tipping point.
As the Wanderers players danced with their fans, Ninkovic in the heart of it, and the Sky Blue hordes filed out glumly, the strains of Don’t Leave Me This Way filled the stadium, played by a DJ with a staggering sense of irony.
Sadly for Sydney, that sentiment had come far, far too late.
