Perth Glory Youth striker Joe Knowles bagged a brace as the Glory youngsters drew 2-2 with Cockburn City in Week Four of the QBE Night series at Dalmatinac Park on Sunday afternoon.
Glory were coming off two narrow defeats against Subiaco and Floreat Athena, and they found themselves behind on the half hour. Spanish striker Angel Andres putting Cockburn City ahead from the penalty spot on the half hour.
But Cockburn’s lead only lasted nine minutes. Mitch Oxborrow’s in-swinging corner was headed home by Knowles at the front post.
Then just before half time the Glory youngster took the lead in identical circumstances. Oxborrow again the supplier and Knowles ghosted in at the near post to head home.
It was almost 3-1 in the first minute of the second half, Kosta Petratos’ thunderbolt crashed off the crossbar from 25-yards.
But sixty seconds later Cockburn received another penalty, when referee Joshua Nixon adjudged Sam Mckearnan had brought down his opponent. Andres stepped up once again, but this time his spot kick hit the crossbar.
It looked like Glory would hang on for the win but seven minutes from time City levelled, Ruben Tristao scoring from close-range to give both sides a share of the spoils.
Knowles said he’s really enjoying his football at the moment and thought they deserved to win the game.
“We had chances to win the game but it wasn’t to be. I’m delighted to have scored a couple of goals, but a win would have been better, but it wasn’t to be,” he said.
“Training full-time with the first team has helped me improve my game a great deal. The standard and the tempo of training is always high and you need to be switched on from start to finish and I believe it’s made me a better player.”
“For sustained periods of the game we were pretty happy but it’s those other periods we need to improve,” Glory coach John Gibson said.
“Overall it was a solid performance, plenty of upside but we need to be able to kill games off.”
Glory Youth will return to the pitch on Sunday against Inglewood United at Inglewood Stadium. Kick-off is 5pm.
Match Details
Perth Glory 2 (Knowles 39’, 44’)
Cockburn City 2 (Andres 30’, Tristeo 83’)
Sunday February 21 2015
Dalmatinac Park
Referee: Joshua Nixon
Assistants: Shane Skinner and Liviu Katona
Perth Glory – GK Jarrad Tyson, 2 Daniel Stynes, 3 Jacob Collard (c), 4 Sam McKearnen, 5 Ross Millard, 6 Calvin Whitney, 7 Kosta Petratos, 8 Mitch Oxborrow, 9 Joe Knowles, 10 Hagi Gligor, 11Nikola Talimdzioski
Subs: RGK Joel Driscoll, 12 Sean Troup, 13 Waliedin Ismail, 14 Alex Tanevski, 15 Thomas Pope
Cockburn City: GK Dominic Savoldelli, 5 Nathan Bowden-Haase, 6 Andrew Emsavana, 7 Ali Gholami, 8 Reuben Tristao, 9 Angel Andres, 10 Harry O’Brien (C), 11 Aiden Da Luz, 12 Jesse Lazzaro, 13 Blake Adams, 18 Kenel Mouithys
Subs: RGK Luke Radonich, 4 Euen Grant, 14 Julian Teles, 15 Liam Murray,
