By Bill Roumeliotis
South Melbourne FC stormed past Preston Lions 5-2 on Tuesday night, progressing to the next qualifying round of Victoria’s Australia Cup.
Held at Connor Reserve in front of around 8,000 spectators, Preston opened the match before the first minute taking the score to 1-0.
South Melbourne took control of the match and managed to equalise 1-1 in the last minute of stoppage time, with Archibald’s header.
The second half left everyone on tenterhooks. In the 62nd minute, South Melbourne’s Brennan scored 1-2 and in the 75th minute, Marshall scored 1-3. In the 84th minute, the Lions reduced it to 2-3 and got back in the game.
But Esteban Quintas’ players did not give up and responded with two goals. In the 88th minute, Lampard made it 2-4 and in the last minute of stoppage time, Sawyer, with a lightning strike from 25 meters, made the final score 5-2.
The goals were wildly celebrated by the 1,000 or so Greek sports fans present. Some threw smoke bombs onto the pitch, as a result of which the match was stopped for 3 minutes until the smoke bombs were thrown out.
