Perth Glory stay fifth after draw with Brisbane Roar

Perth Glory stayed fifth on the A-League ladder after drawing 1-1 at home with the visiting eighth-ranked Brisbane Roar this evening.

Both sides were poor in attack and less than reliable in defence.

Their passing was woeful, particularly in the final third, and their first touch was awful.

Henrique had the ball in the net for Brisbane in the 10^th minute, but it was disallowed because of off-side.

In the 16^th minute, Brisbane’s Serginho Van Dijk fired a free-kick wide.

Perth almost scored in the 17^th minute when Naum Sekulovski did well to get over a left-wing cross, but Branko Jelic’s header came back off the bar.

The ball fell to Adriano Pellegrino, whose tame header went straight to Brisbane goalkeeper Griffin McMaster.

In the 21^st minute, Jelic had a dangerous shot turned over the bar by McMaster for a corner.

Two minutes later, McMaster did well to block at the feet of Pellegrino.

Luke DeVere gave Brisbane the lead in the 52^nd minute after clever play on the left by Van Dijk resulted in a corner.

The corner to the far post was headed back in by Josh McLoughin and Devere fired home from point-blank range.

Substitute Jamie Harnwell equalised in the 78^th minute after a great cross to the far post from the left by Todd Howarth.

Pellegrino nodded the ball back for Harnwell to strike, but McMaster should have saved instead of allowing the ball to strike his arm and trickle over the line.

Both sides missed glorious chances to win in the closing minutes.

In the 85^th minute, substitute Michael Zullo fed Mitch Nichols down the right and he passed to Van Dijk, whose first touch was poor and the chance went begging.

In the final minute, a superb outside-of-the-left foot shot by Howarth was brilliantly saved by McMaster.