Central Coast coach Nick Montgomery was shocked that Tom Glover was able to play against the Mariners on Tuesday, believing the Melbourne City goalkeeper should have been suspended for throwing a flare into the crowd at the abandoned Melbourne derby.
Former Mariners keeper Glover made a crucial second-half save at AAMI Park to deny his old club and ensure City held for a 1-0 win courtesy of a first-half Jamie Maclaren goal.
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While being cleared physically to play despite being concussed and suffering a cut face when a bucket was thrown at him during the pitch invasion by Melbourne Victory fans at the same venue on December 17, Glover’s participation in Tuesday’s match had been in doubt because if a potential ban for throwing a flare – that had been thrown in his direction – back into a crowd of Victory supporters.
However, with referee Alex King having written in his derby match report that Glover had not intended for the flare to land among the Victory fans, an independent match review plan decided the goalkeeper should not be charged with “violent conduct” and did not suspend him.
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“It was a great save from Tommy Glover (to deny Michael Ruhs an equaliser for the Mariners),” Montgomery said.
“He’s a very good keeper (but) how he’s playing, I’ll never know. I don’t think anyone expected him to play today after what happened last week but he did, he pulled off a great save and he saved (City’s win).
“Throwing a firework (flare) back into a crowd of people, all the talk afterwards was that he would be suspended, and I actually thought he would be.
“I don’t want people suspended, but … I had a laugh with him after (the match) and said ‘you must be the only person that can throw a firework and not get suspended’.
“If he (Ruhs) scores that, maybe we could have gone on and won the game, but we didn’t.”
However, interim City coach Rado Vidosic backed Glover, saying the MRP decision not to suspend the goalkeeper was “correct”.
“In those (MRP) situations you never know what’s going to happen, but we don’t believe that he (Glover) did anything wrong,” Vidosic said.
“He was excellent throughout the week, he was always with the players, he only trained for the last few days with the group, but I think he was excellent today – spotless, perfect (and a) clean sheet for him.
“He’ll love that.”
Montgomery – whose own goalkeeper Danny Vukovic also excelled to deny Maclaren from the penalty spot in first-half stoppage time – also wanted the match pushed back to a later starting time such were the hot conditions.
Having originally been scheduled to kick off at 5pm (AEDT), the match was moved back to 5.30pm in a decision made last week.
“The conditions in the first half … I don’t know why they couldn’t have pushed the game (back) a little bit later. That would have made the game better,” Montgomery said.
