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Warren firstly couldn't keep up with his man, poorly tracking Archie Thompson's pacey run, and the Victory striker latched onto a Nichols cross to peg one back in the 17th minute.
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| Crowd was 18 784 for the BeyondBlue Cup |
Then in the 25th Warren confirmed that he is one of the worst defenders to wear a sky blue shirt since Michael Frontzeck failed miserably for City. As the last man Warren denied Connor Pain a clear goalscoring opportunity and was given a straight red with the resultant freekick resulting in a goal to James Troisi.
It's hard to understand why the youngster is keeping Matthew Jurman out of the match-day squad after consistently under-performing. Perhaps with Farina now forced to play without him for at least a week it will give Jurman an opportunity to prove his worth.
A beautiful early goal to Richard Garcia and a Seb Ryall 'header' gave the home team their two goal buffer.
Garcia rounded an advancing Nathan Coe and slotted home in the opening minutes of the match. Ten minutes later Adama Traore attempted to head away a cross into the box from Ali Abbas but the ball only went as far as Seb Ryall's nose, ricocheted, and found its way into the net. Ryall couldn't have scored better if he'd known anything about it.
One man team Alessandro Del Piero won a penalty and regained the lead for the home side on 33 minutes. Victory's foreign marquee Contreras went over the top of Del Piero to gift Sydney the goal advantage they'd ultimately take to the final whistle.
Frank Farina looked stunned at the performance of Marc Warren, but put the initial goal from Victory down to Seb Ryall's absence from the pitch following his nosey goal.
"I thought we were going well but they scored both goals when we were down to ten men. It's consolation but still disappointing.
"We can't afford that we spoke all through preseason about disipline and what not. Young Marc will learn that he made a mistake. Fortunately it didn't cost us in the end."
The Sydney coach also sighted Warren's age as reason behind the player's actions.
"I was a bit disappointed really. Marc's still young and he's still learning but he made a mistake, I'll leave it at that.
The win is good timing for the under pressure Farina, who now has a basis on which to work from moving forward. The return of Del Piero to the starting lineup was also instrumental in the team's dominant display over a somewhat headless Melbourne Victory.