Goalkeepers are usually bearing the brunt of criticism however Brisbane Roar’s Michael Theoklitos and Gold Coast United’s Glen Moss have both been praised for their stunning performances in Sunday’s scoreless M1 Derby at Skilled Park.
The former Melbourne Victory glovemen have both had their moments in the past year, with Theoklitos- seven-goal howler for Norwich seeing him spend the rest of the 2009-10 English League One season warming the bench.
While for Moss, his services at the Victory were surplus to requirement as journeyman Michael Petkovic returned home to Australia winning over Ernie Merrick-s confidence in the bid to replace young prodigy Mitch Langerak.
Exactly one year on from his disastrous match against Colchester, Theoklitos- triumphant return to the A-League was heralded by Roar coach Ange Postecoglou.
“Michael-s a very good goalkeeper he-s won a couple of championships and also (A-League) goalkeeper of the year,” he said.
” I know a lot of focus is on what happened to him last year, but I-ve known him for a long time and he-s got a really good head on his shoulders.”
Pleased with the custodian-s ability to stay focused throughout the entire match after Brisbane climbed all over United during the first-half, Postecoglou added: “He stayed switched on…sometimes when they-re not in action you worry, but he had to make a couple of critical saves especially off Joel (Porter) when he had a one-on-one.”
“Joel-s a good finisher, but Michael stood up well and he was definitely important for us.”
After bringing in 12 new signings much was made about how Postecoglou-s new-look side would perform against their arch rivals, however the Roar mentor seemed impressed with his side-s dominance even without a designated striker playing up-front.
“The reality is we were a little bit light up-front with Reinaldo and Solarzano not quite ready,” he explained.
“At the end of the game I would have loved to have thrown on a striker when it opened up a bit. But having said all that, I was really pleased with the way the guys went about it for the whole game.”
“I thought we were really dominant but sometimes in games like that if you don-t put teams away it can come back and bite you. It was a credit to the boys that when we had to defend we did it well.”
Ever thankful and breathing a sigh of relief after the match, Gold Coast-s captain Jason Culina said Moss- spectacular efforts during the clash typified why coach Miron Bleiberg signed the All-White.
“That-s why Miron brought him to the club because he-s a good keeper and he showed today that he deserves to be playing, and playing at Gold Coast United,” Culina said.
“Today he saved us a few times and hopefully we can sort things out so he doesn-t get so worked next week, but we-re glad to have him here and hopefully he turns into a really good keeper for us.”
Discussing the draw Bleiberg said he felt that Gold Coast played like the away-team early in the match, adding that United may have underestimated the Roar.
“In the first-half we gave them the yellow shirt and they gave us the orange shirt.
They played like Gold Coast United and we played like Brisbane Roar,” he said.
“It wasn-t good (the result) and if you want me to point the finger why… maybe we were over confident and underestimated the opposition.”
