Melbourne Derby (A-League)

Melbourne Derby

A Melbourne Derby match at Etihad Stadium in progress in 2014.
Locale Melbourne
Teams Melbourne City
Melbourne Victory
First meeting Melbourne City 2–1 Melbourne Victory
(8 October 2010)
Latest meeting Melbourne Victory 0–2 Melbourne City (25 October 2016)
Next meeting 17 December 2016
Statistics
Meetings total 21
Most wins Melbourne Victory, Melbourne City FC (8)
Top scorer Besart Berisha (7)
Largest victory Melbourne City 4–0 Melbourne Victory
(1 March 2014)

The Melbourne Derby is an intra-city local derby in Australia's premier football competition, the A-League. It is contested between the two Melbourne teams in the competition, Melbourne City and Melbourne Victory, and was the A-League's first intra-city derby. Until 2014, Melbourne City competed under the name Melbourne Heart FC.

History

With the introduction of Melbourne Heart (who would later be known as Melbourne City) to the A-League at the start of the 2010–11 season (the Victory having joined the league at inception), the first derby was held on 8 October 2010 at AAMI Park. The match was originally scheduled for 2 October 2010 however due to the 2010 AFL Grand Final Replay occurring on the same day, the match was postponed.[1]

Melbourne Heart won the inaugural derby 2–1, with goals from Alex Terra and John Aloisi. Robbie Kruse scored for Victory. Aziz Behich was sent off late in the second half, but Heart were able to hold on and secure the win. Although the game was an official sell out, only 25,897 fans turned up, well short of AAMI Park's official capacity of 30,050. The Victory hosted their first home derby on 22 January at Docklands Stadium, with the match ending in a 2–2 draw.[2] The match was marred by an unacceptable tackle by Kevin Muscat on Adrian Zahra, which earned the Victory captain his second straight red card and a subsequent eight-match ban, ending not only his season, but his A-League career.[3]

The first scoreless draw in the derby occurred in the third round of 2011/12 season, whilst a record crowd at AAMI Park was in attendance for the second derby of the season. This derby was arguably one of the best in the rivalry's brief existence, with Heart midfieldier Matt Thompson scoring twice in a matter of minutes late in the first half to put Heart in the lead 2–1, before Heart substitute Alex Terra scored controversially after appearing to handball preceding his goal in the second half. Heart would win the match 3–2.[4] The intense rivalry and passion between both sets of supporters occasionally boiled over, as occurred in February 2011 when four Melbourne Heart supporters were charged with "conspiracy to falsely imprison a [Victory supporter] ".[5]

In the 2014/15 season, Heart underwent a takeover by the City Football Group. Melbourne City had their first derby win under the new management that season, winning the pre-Christmas derby 1-0 with Erik Paartalu scoring one of the latest winners in a derby.[6] Victory and City later met in the Finals Series for the first time, in front of a derby record attendance of 50,873 at Etihad Stadium. Melbourne Victory won the Semi Final convincingly with a score of 3-0, with goals from Besart Berisha, Kosta Barbarouses and Archie Thompson.[7] The third derby of the 2015/16 season was marred by a series of flares let off both outside AAMI Park before the match and inside the arena during the match by some Melbourne Victory supporters. The poor behaviour from Victory fans also extended to "an alleged assault on TV news personnel outside the stadium, throwing missiles at Melbourne City player Thomas Sørensen and a Victoria Police officer, and altercations with police after the match".[8] Football Federation Australia subsequently issued Melbourne Victory a $50,000 club fine and a suspended three competition points deduction.[8] On the field, the match was lauded as one of the most "captivating" derbies of the rivalry and featured an incredible passage of play for a goal from City striker Bruno Fornaroli.[9] In Round 2 of the 2016/17 season, City recorded just their second ever derby win at Etihad Stadium, comfortably defeating Victory 4-1. The match featured the A-League debut of Socceroos all-time leading goal scorer Tim Cahill for City, who scored an incredible long-range goal to open City's account.[10]

The two rivals were drawn for their first FFA Cup derby in 2016, at the semi-final stage of the tournament. Melbourne City advanced to the Final, knocking out Victory 2-0 in what was one of the most spiteful clashes between the two rivals.

Matches

Heart/Victory era

Season Derby
 Comp*Date
Home team
 Score
Away team
 Goals (home)
 Goals (away)
 Venue
 Attendance
2010–11 1 RS8 October 2010Heart2–1VictoryAloisi (10), Terra (56) Kruse (35) AAMI Park25,897
2 RS11 December 2010Heart1–3VictorySibon (17) Kruse (12, 28), OG Srhoj (54) AAMI Park23,059
3 RS22 January 2011Victory2–2HeartAllsopp (11), Hernández (30) Aloisi (45+2, 51)Etihad Stadium32,231
2011–12 4 RS22 October 2011Victory0–0 Heart--Etihad Stadium39,309
5 RS23 December 2011Heart3–2VictoryThompson (37, 39), Terra (62) Thompson (21), Hernández (90+2) AAMI Park26,579
6 RS4 February 2012Heart0–0 Victory--AAMI Park26,396
2012–13 7 RS5 October 2012Victory1–2 Heart Rojas (24) Williams (14), Macallister (45+2) Etihad Stadium42,032
8 RS22 December 2012Heart1–2VictoryFred (81)Rojas (67), Thompson (90+2) AAMI Park26,457
9 RS2 February 2013Victory2–1HeartThompson (29), Milligan (55)Williams (72) Etihad Stadium41,203
2013–14 10 RS12 October 2013Victory0–0 Heart--Etihad Stadium45,202
11 RS21 December 2013Heart1–3 VictoryKalmar (80)Nichols (28, 63), Troisi (60)AAMI Park26,491
12 RS1 March 2014Heart4–0Victory Engelaar (8), Dugandzic (15) Williams (83) Kewell (86) -AAMI Park25,546

City/Victory era

Season Derby
 Comp*Date
Home team
 Score
Away team
 Goals (home)
 Goals (away)
 Venue
 Attendance
2014–15 13 RS25 October 2014Victory5–2City Thompson (23, 87), Berisha (45+1, 46, 67) Wielaert (13), Jason Hoffman (26) Etihad Stadium43,729
14 RS20 December 2014City1–0VictoryPaartalu (90)-AAMI Park26,372
15 RS7 February 2015Victory3–0CityBerisha (10), Barbarouses (53), Ben Khalfallah (62)-Etihad Stadium40,042
16 Semi-Final8 May 2015Victory3–0 CityBerisha (18), Barbarouses (30), Thompson (87)-Etihad Stadium50,873
2015–16 17 RS17 October 2015Victory3–2CityBen Khalfallah (23), Barbarouses (57), Berisha (90)Fornaroli (68), Mauk (71)Etihad Stadium40,217
18 RS19 December 2015City2–1VictoryMauk (20), Retre (30)Berisha (45)AAMI Park23,572
19 RS13 February 2016City2–2VictoryFornaroli (22, 31)Ben Khalfallah (29), Finkler (47)AAMI Park25,738
2016–17 20 RS15 October 2016Victory1–4CityRojas (62)Cahill (27), Fornaroli (31), Brattan (52), Brandán (62)Etihad Stadium43,188
21FFA Cup25 October 2016Victory0–2City-Brattan (9), Brandán (77)AAMI Park15,791
22RS17 December 2016CityVictoryAAMI Park
23RS4 February 2017VictoryCityEtihad Stadium

* RS: A-League Regular Season, FS: A-League Finals Series, GF: A-League Grand Final, CUP: FFA Cup

Statistics

As of 25 October 2016, there have been 21 competitive meetings between the teams. Thus far, both Victory and City have won on eight separate occasions, with five games drawn. The first finals series derby match occurred on May 8, 2015, a game which Victory won 3-0. The first FFA Cup derby came in the 2016 Semi-finals, which City won 0-2.

The biggest victory went to City,[lower-alpha 1] who won 4–0 in on 1 March 2014. The most frequent result in the derby is 2–1, which has occurred in five encounters, City having won three of those games.

Competition City wins Draws Victory wins City goals Victory goals
League 7 5 7 30 34
Finals 0 0 1 0 3
FFA Cup 1 0 0 2 0
Total 8 5 8 32 37

Top goalscorers

Player Club Goals
Albania Besart Berisha Melbourne Victory 7
Australia Archie Thompson Melbourne Victory 6
Uruguay Bruno Fornaroli Melbourne City 4
Australia John Aloisi Melbourne City 3
New Zealand Kosta Barbarouses Melbourne Victory
Tunisia Fahid Ben Khalfallah Melbourne Victory
Australia Robbie Kruse Melbourne Victory
Australia David Williams Melbourne City
Brazil Alex Terra Melbourne City

Players who have played for both clubs

Correct as of 6 November 2015
Player Melbourne Heart/City career Melbourne Victory career
Span League
apps		 League
goals		 Span League
apps		 League
goals
Australia Aziz Behich 2010–2014 89 2 2009–2010 5 0
Australia Mate Dugandžić 2011–2015 56 11 2009–2011 36 7
Brazil Fred 2011–2013 38 3 2006–2007 20 4
Australia Harry Kewell 2013–2014 16 2 2011–2012 25 8
Australia Paulo Retre 2013– 26 1 2011–2012 0 0
Australia Kristian Sarkies 2010–2012 12 2 2005–2007 35 3
Australia Tando Velaphi 2013–2015 20 0 2011–2013 3 0

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ At the time, the club was known as Melbourne Heart

References

  1. ↑ "First Melbourne derby delayed". The Age. 27 September 2010.
  2. ↑ Victory, Heart draw first derby at Docklands Stadium at WebCite (archived 13 February 2011)
  3. ↑ "Kevin Muscat banned for eight games for tackle on Adrian Zahra". Herald-Sun. 28 January 2011. Archived from the original on 2011-02-12. Retrieved 12 February 2011.
  4. ↑ "Melbourne Heart defeat Melbourne Victory 3-2 in cracking A-League derby at AAMI Park". Fox Sports News. 23 December 2011.
  5. ↑ "A-League: Melbourne derby rivalry turns nasty". Herald Sun. 26 February 2011.
  6. ↑ "Melbourne City 1-0 Melbourne Victory: Paartalu nets dramatic winner". Goal.com. 20 December 2014.
  7. ↑ Muscat hails 'deserved' Victory triumph Official FFA Match Report, 9 May 2015
  8. 1 2 "Melbourne Victory accepts $50,000 fine and suspended points deduction handed down by FFA". ABC News. 17 February 2016.
  9. ↑ "A-League Melbourne derby: Bruno Fornaroli's Magic lights up game as 10-man City hold on for draw". Sydney Morning Herald. 13 February 2016.
  10. ↑ "Melbourne Victory's noisy neighbours take over the party and stake a claim to be top dogs". Fairfax Media. 16 October 2016.
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