Sellout expected for Jets' historic home final against Victory
Newcastle’s historic home A-League grand final is expected to sell out by Tuesday as excitement about the Jets’ "dream" season reaches new heights.
For the first time a decider will be held outside a capital city and Melbourne Victory fans were scrambling on Sunday to snap up Newcastle accommodation to support their team in Saturday night’s unexpected showdown.
Members of both clubs snapped up 20,000 tickets within the first six hours of them going on sale, causing the FFA to bring forward sales to the general public to 1pm on Monday.
A capacity crowd will easily break the stadium’s A-League attendance record of 24,338 at the Jets’ 2007 preliminary-final win over Sydney.
Win, and the Jets will not only claim their first title in a decade, but also become the first club in the competition’s history to rise from wooden spooners to champions in a single season.
Cliche would define the club’s inexorable rise under Ernie Merrick as a fairytale – and there’s hardly a more fitting way to describe it. Even after finishing second on the ladder to exceed pre-season expectations, so much still had to go right for them to enjoy playing for the title before their own fans amid a 33,000-strong capacity crowd at McDonald Jones Stadium.
Not least the challenge of defeating in-form Melbourne City in their semi-final and hoping Victory could beat hoodoo side Sydney FC in enemy territory.
That on-loan Jet Riley McGree scored one of the world’s best goals in the process provided the kind of bonus the club’s superstitious chief executive Lawrie McKinna welcomed.
‘‘What the Jets have done this year proves that dreams come true,’’ McKinna said. ‘‘The squad set themselves goals at the beginning of the season to get in that top four, and we finished top two.
They said we should get one boy in the national team and we got two.
‘‘And to have a grand final in Newcastle with a sell-out crowd will just be great for football and the A-League - and absolutely amazing for Newcastle.’’
AAP