Adelaide United have continued their run as Perth Glory's bogey side this season beating the A-League football leaders 2-1 in sweltering conditions in Perth.
Adelaide United players celebrate a goal. Photo: PHOTOSPORT
Kick-off was pushed back from 5pm local time to 5.30pm on Monday but that made no difference with the temperature at 39 degrees at kick-off and still 35 by full-time.
Despite the difficult conditions, the teams delivered an entertaining affair with Nebojsa Marinkovic scoring for Glory in the 11th minute against the run of play.
Adelaide however continued to make the majority of the running, leading to goals from Craig Goodwin in the 31st minute and then the winner in the 49th thanks to James Jeggo.
Adelaide have now handed Perth their only two losses of the A-League season on top of beating them in the final of the inaugural FFA Cup.
The result means the Wellington Phoenix remain second on the ladder just four points behind leaders Perth.
Adelaide stay third.
Perth remains three points clear on top heading into the league's two-week Asian Cup hiatus and given the extreme heat, and the three-day turnaround from Friday's 2-1 win over Melbourne Victory, coach Kenny Lowe will remain a happy man over the next fortnight.
Adelaide made all the running in the opening 10 minutes, but Glory did what has become their trademark and scored early in the 11th minute.
Andy Keogh perfectly put the ball into the path of Marinkovic, who then struck a ground ball past Reds' keeper Paul Izzo, allowing the home side to lead 1-0.
It didn't last long and even though Adelaide were creating their own chances, the equaliser came courtesy of a horror mistake from one of Glory's most experienced and reliable campaigners.
Richard Garcia took things far too easy in his own half and with little pressure on him, he horribly miscued a back pass towards keeper Danny Vukovic, only for Goodwin to swoop for Adelaide and easily beat Vukovic to score.
Scores remained tied going into half-time but Adelaide continued to attack hard, ending up with what turned out to be the match-winner in the 49th minute.
Sergio Cirio set up Bruce Djite down the flank, putting the ball into the path of Jeggo in the box, who coolly slotted it past Vukovic.
Adelaide coach Josep Gombau was delighted with the win because of the huge difference between six points off top and 12 adrift.
"I am so happy because we know to win here, in this place, is very difficult," he said.
"To get these three points, it has big value because if we had lost this game there would have been a 12 points difference, now there's six."
"To take this break now... coming after this win, we will recharge our batteries and then come back."
The Glory coach Kenny Lowe felt his team deserved at least a point but as Perth remains six points clear and were on an eight-game home winning streak, he was not too disappointed.
"The boys came out in the second half and really put a shift in, really had a go trying to get back into the game. I thought we finished the stronger side," he said.
"Fair play to our players and we probably should have got something out of it in the end, but you can't win them all."
