Recap
The first game of Round 4 saw winless Metropolitan pitted against newly promoted Ashburton, who were fresh off their first win last round against Carlton. Dino Redzepovic was the the first to get on the board as he ran through and opened the scoring. Iraj Hani then got in front of his man on the edge of the area before levelling the scores. D.Redzepovic then finished his second into the bottom corner before Ashburton hit back with two goals through Behrad Behzadpour and Amir Behroozi. Alija Redzepovic arrived at the back post to the level the scores but Ahmad Hassani would finish to late in the half to have Ashburton ahead going into half time.
The second half saw the flood gates open as 12 goals were scored as both teams started to get stretched at the back. Ashburton’s lethal front man Mehran Shafiei put his side two goals to the good early on as he volleyed home from a long throw. A.Redzepovic added his second at the back post to cut the lead back to one, before Shafiei went on a brilliant solo run before finishing from a tight angle. D.Redzepovic completed his hatrick to cut the lead down again before Behzadpour extended it back out to two. Two quick goals from Metropolitan, from Dino and Alija Redzepovic respectively saw Metro back level, before Dino scored his fifth of the match to have Metro leading 8-7. After a period of pressure on the Metro goal, Shafiei completed his hatrick to level and after that it was all Ashburton. Behzadpour put Ashburton back in front, and with minutes left Metropolitan resorted to playing fifth man. It didn’t go to plan at all, however, as AShburton added two more goals into an open net at the death to wrap up a thrilling win.
Man of the Match: Mehran Shafiei (Ashburton FC)