Thursday, 12 September 2013 10:58 PM
By John Kyrou
South Melbourne FC hosts Victorian Premier League leaders Northcote City at Lakeside Stadium on Saturday night in a match that the home side needs to win in order to keep control of its destiny in the race for finals football in 2013. Winning its final two games against Northcote and then Port Melbourne (next Sunday 22 September) will confirm Chris Taylor’s side a spot in the top five, however it will not be easy to achieve against the teams currently ranked first and fourth on the League table.
South goes into Saturday night having lost its previous game 2-1 against the Melbourne Knights in the derby at Somers Street on 1 September. Although Tyson Holmes scored a great goal to level the scores before halftime, South could not put away its chances in the second half and were punished when Andrew Barisic curled a wonderful effort past Peter Gavalas to give the Knights all three points. Northcote goes into the match on the back of a come-from-behind 2-1 win against Dandenong Thunder at John Cain Reserve. Northcote will win the Minor Premiership should it defeat South on Saturday due to its three point lead and +23 goal difference ahead of the Melbourne Knights.
In the corresponding fixture played between the two sides on Sunday 3 June 2012, James Kalifatidis got on the end of a flicked header from a long ball and slotted the ball past Peter Gavalas for what proved to be the winning goal. Earlier this season on 23 June at John Cain Reserve, a Milos Lujic first half goal was followed by a Kristian Konstantinidis header and a Michael Catalano thunderbolt that resulted in Northcote hammering South 3-0 in what was a deserved result.
Fans are reminded that the Under-21s match kicks off at 4PM on Saturday and will be followed by a South Legends match at 6PM that is a curtain-raiser to the main game at 8PM.