Bendigo City seniors keep State League play-off hopes alive

A successful penalty from coach Greg Thomas in the dying seconds lifted the Bendigo City seniors to a 3-2 away win over Deakin University at the weekend.

The three points kept fourth-placed Bendigo (36 points) in touch with third-placed Melton (38 points) in the race for a play-off berth.

The third-ranked team at the end of the home and away season goes into a play-off series to earn promotion for 2024.

"We have to win every game to give ourselves a chance and we knew Deakin would be a danger game,'' Thomas said.

"It's a difficult place to go and get a result. We went 1-0 down early to a soft penalty, but we responded pretty quickly.

"We got 2-1 up and they went down to 10 men. We dominated play, but we couldn't get that third goal to kill the game off.

"They scored with about 15 minutes to go to make it 2-2, which gave us a scare, but thankfully we scored from a penalty at the end to win the game."

Luke Burns scored his 22nd goal of the campaign for Bendigo, while Darius Thomas also found the back of the net.

The negative for Bendigo was a red card to Alex Caldow at the end of the game.

The striker is now likely to be suspended for at least two of the club's final three matches, starting with next Saturday's huge game against second-placed West Point.

Meanwhile, the injury-ravaged Bendigo City under-18s went down to Western United 8-3.

Jasper Williams scored a cracking goal from outside of the box to give Bendigo a 1-0 lead inside the first three minutes.

Bendigo held the lead until the 20-minute mark, but once Western United equalised the flood gates opened.

Western United led 4-1 at the break before Bendigo striker Hamish Walker scored twice in the second-half.

"It was a difficult day,'' coach Greg Thomas said.

"Every mistake we made we got punished for. Credit to the boys, we only had 12 fit players and then we lost a couple of players with injuries through the game.

"My son (Kai) rushed back from the under-15s to sit on the bench in case of emergency and he had to come on and play the last 30 minutes.

"It was a tough ask for a 15-year-old to come on and play in the NPL1 under-18s against an A-League club. He did really well.

"Injuries are really hurting us, we had to play players out of position.

"The boys fought hard to the end and didn't drop their heads.

"The good sign was we scored three goals. Melbourne Victory was held scoreless by Western United a couple of weeks ago."

Bendigo City under-18s are at home to Port Melbourne next Sunday.

In the weekend's junior games, a brace from Lueder De Podolinsky lifted Bendigo's under-14s to a 2-0 win over Hume City.

The under-15s suffered a 2-0 loss to Hume City, while the under-16s went down 4-0 to Hume City.

Read more: Catch up on the latest local footy news

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can access our trusted content: