Roar Women maintain top spot

Brisbane Roar Women remain top of the Westfield W-League ladder after a 0-0 draw against Melbourne Victory at Epping Stadium on Sunday.

Before kick-off, both sides acknowledged a minute silence in memory of the victims of the Brisbane floods, which is the reason the game was moved from Brisbane to Melbourne.

After an uneventful opening to the game, a free kick from Roar forward Amy Chapman was as close as either side came to scoring with her shot breezing just over the crossbar.

Melbourne Victory forward Caitlin Friend took a chance to get in front with a shot at goal, which was slightly wide of the goal post.

A mistake made by Victory defender Marlies Oostdam almost let Roar midfielder Tameka Butt in to score however she missed her chance by passing the ball one to many times.

The game remained at 0-0 with neither side able to find the back of the net with the few opportunities that appeared.

With five minutes remaining the Roar-s chance to get ahead was snuffed out when Melbourne midfielder Stephanie Catley tackled Roar substitute Emily Glelnik.

Brisbane Roar coach Jeff Hopkins said that it was a disappointing game and but praised his side-s ability to take a point from a match in difficult conditions.

“We weren-t a focused as we usually are,” he said.

“There will be a few things that we will work on at training this to get the girls thinking right and focused again.”

According to Hopkins, the sudden change in venue was a bit of a disruption but nothing his team couldn-t handle.

“We got down here a day early and had a play on the field,” he said.

“I know a few of the girls were worried about something going wrong up at home, but we didn-t play to our usual standard and we paid for that.”

Coming into the last couple of weeks to the season, Hopkins said the girls need to work hard and put on a good performance.

“All we can do is play really well in the Newcastle game and put in a good performance,” he said.