Melrose 2 Albury City 0: Etienne Gisubizo with both goals at Melrose Park

It finished 2-0 at Melrose Park but the margin should have been far greater, with the home side creating enough chances to win several games.

A combination of poor finishing and fine goalkeeping left the door open for City until a penalty converted by the lively Etienne Gisubizo, 10 minutes from time, finally put the result beyond doubt.

On this showing, Melrose will present a force to be reckoned with come finals time but co-coach Brett McLennan wasn't looking any further than the three points.

"The biggest key for us today was getting off the mark," he said.

"To draw United round one and then have a bye, if you drop points today, you're sitting three games in down at the bottom of the table somewhere.

"It was super to grind one out.

"I know we could have scored a lot more goals but it could, quite easily, have been 2-1 or 2-2 at one stage.

"The most important thing for us today, at 1-0, was a clean sheet.

"That's all we cared about and if we knocked one in, beauty, but clean sheets in this league are beautiful things."

Patrick Brown forced a good early save from Josh Fluss but thereafter Melrose took control.

City keeper Nelson Burns was guilty of a poor kick out but more than redeemed himself by arching his back to touch Adam Waters' pinpoint chip onto the crossbar.

The ball dropped for Gisubizo with the goal gaping but his header also hit the bar.

Waters' rasping half-volley from outside the box brought the best out of Burns again and Melrose continued to boss things only for their decision-making in the final third to let them down.

Gisubizo pounced for the opener when he nipped in to round Burns, eight minutes before half-time, although David Samiec struck the angle of crossbar and post with a speculative effort at the other end which left Fluss a mere spectator.

But half-chances for Melrose before the break turned into glaring opportunities after it, Gisubizo firing straight at Burns, who then saved well to deny Stephen McDaid in a goalmouth scramble.

Merci Rabani did the hard part, twisting away from two defenders, but then dragged his shot well wide with only Burns to beat.

Rhys Carty almost punished their profligacy with a low shot which deflected narrowly wide, but when Prince Muhoza was tripped by Samiec as he burst into the box, Gisubizo's cool spot-kick which found the bottom right-hand corner was the very least Melrose deserved.

Elsewhere, Wangaratta beat Albury United 4-2 to go clear at the top and Cobram ran out 5-0 winners against Myrtleford, while Albury Hotspurs thrashed St Pats 8-0 at Alexandra Park.

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