Shootout at the A-League corral

With the stands pushed closer to the pitch and almost every seat at Etihad Stadium occupied the atmosphere inside the dome seemed to push Melbourne Victory forward.

Mindful that it couldn’t allow the home side space and time in between the lines or behind the defence, Sydney FC sat deep and compact. It was going to take the individual unpredictability of Archie Thompson, Carlos Hernandez and Robbie Kruse to break down the Sydney wall.

But when Victory lost Thompson to a knee injury early on the psychological pendulum moved slightly towards the visiting side.

Thompson’s replacement, Marvin Angulo, still gave the Sydney defence plenty of headaches as Melbourne continued to push numbers forward.

As always Vitezslav Lavicka had a plan.

The Achilles heel of Victory’s 3-4-3 is the room left behind when the wide midfielders go forward. Lavicka’s plan was to absorb the pressure and break quickly with Chris Payne and Alex Brosque peeling wide into the space vacated by the advanced Nick Ward or Surat Sukha.

The one missing ingredient for the harbour city club was the man who usually pulls the strings in the middle; Steve Corica. The veteran playmaker constantly finds room in the centre allowing him to pick out the runs of the Sydney strikers with perfectly placed balls.

Although a wonderfully gifted player himself, Mark Bridge admitted he is still learning that position.

With chances few and far between it was going to take something out the ordinary to break the deadlock. That’s exactly what happened.

As Melbourne ran off celebrating Roddy Vargas’s disallowed goal, Sydney in an act of defiant revenge, took a quick free-kick.

Brosque created space for the cross, it took a deflection which left Mitch Langerak stranded and allowed Bridge the simple task of nodding home from close range to give the Sky Blues the lead.

Sydney suddenly looked more confident, the crisp, neat, passing so evident throughout the season was back on show.

Payne missed a glorious chance to kill off the game in the second half but it was still going to take something from left field for Melbourne to pull it out of the fire.

The equaliser arrived from a tried and tested Victory tactic, the quick free kick.

After falling victim to it two weeks ago, no one could believe Sydney had been fooled again. Kevin Muscat was again the instigator, this time Adrian Leijer provided the finish.

Sensing blood and buoyed by a now fervent home crowd, Victory piled on the pressure and was perhaps unlucky not to snatch a winner in the regulation 90 minutes.

Lavicka calmed his troops before extra-time and it seemed to have an effect as Sydney controlled possession, but like Melbourne beforehand, it couldn’t find the killer blow.

So Australian football's showpiece encounter went to penalties, for the first time since the epic NSL clash between Perth Glory and Wollongong Wolves a decade ago.

My first thought was Sydney would win because Clint Bolton has more experience in these situations and I distinctly remember him saving a penalty against Portugal at the 1995 World Youth Cup.

When Langerak stretched to his right to deny Shannon Cole with a magnificent save and level the score that prediction seemed foolish.

However, in the end it was a Bolton save to deny Angulo that paved the way for Sydney's grand final success and a second A-League championship - the same number Melbourne Victory has.

In a mirror of the entire 2009-2010 A-League season there was little to split the sides, a point and penalty kick was all that did.