Perth Glory will collect the wooden spoon for the second time in the space of three years after sinking to a 4-3 A-League Men loss to Western United at HBF Park.
Glory entered Sunday’s match under huge pressure to rebound following last week’s record 8-0 loss to Melbourne City.
The demons from that horror show looked to have resurfaced when Matthew Grimaldi struck for United in the fourth minute.
But a double from Adam Taggart – which lifted the Glory striker to the top of the ALM’s golden-boot standings with 19 goals – put Perth on track for victory.
Glory thought they had gone 3-1 up in the 62nd minute when David Williams stripped his opponent of the ball and scored.
Williams was left fuming when referee Shane Skinner rubbed out the goal after deeming the Glory striker had committed a foul.
The decision proved a crucial turning point, with goals from Riku Danzaki, Abel Walatee and a late strike from Oliver Lavale putting Western United ahead 4-2.
Williams scored in the third minute of added time to give Glory hope of snatching a draw, but Western United held firm in a nervy final few minutes.
The result means second-from-bottom United are now four points clear of Glory with just one round remaining.
The visitors opened the scoring in the fourth minute when Lachlan Wales slid a pass through Glory’s flat-footed defence and Grimaldi dinked the ball over the goalkeeper.
Taggart levelled the scores in the 23rd minute with a powerful header from a pin-point John Koutroumbis cross.
The 30-year-old scored his 19th goal of the season – the most by any Glory player in an A-League campaign – when he capitalised on a defensive brain-fade from Tomoki Imai.
Imai, after receiving a short pass from keeper Tom Heward-Belle, attempted to fend off Glory attacker Stefan Colakovski.
But while occupied with that, and with the ball rolling too far in front of the keeper, Taggart raced in to thump home from six yards out.
Glory players were in disbelief when Williams’ goal wasn’t allowed in the 62nd minute.
Western United rubbed salt into the wound three minutes later when Danzaki levelled with a long-range low drive.
Walatee capitalised on Glory’s tiring defence nine minutes later to nail his own low drive, before Lavale sealed the deal in stoppage time when Glory midfielder Giordano Colli was stripped of the ball in defence.
Glory face Sydney away in their final game of the season next week, while Western United are up against Melbourne City.
