Aiden O’Neill settles Melbourne derby three months after scoring opening goal

Aiden O’Neill scored two goals in the Melbourne derby – one before it was abandoned and one after it was resumed – and in between, his career took off. Melbourne City midfielder O’Neill scored a scintillating strike 11 minutes into the 17 December derby, but it was called off 10 minutes later following a violent pitch invasion from Melbourne Victory fans.

On Wednesday night, he added another belter on its resumption – officially 46 minutes after his first, or as coach Rado Vidosic put it, three months later – to lead City to a 2-1 win and a five-point lead in the table. In between the two, O’Neill played 14 A-League Men games, scored two more goals and earned his first two Socceroos caps.

“Coming into a game that you’ve already scored in is a pretty weird feeling – obviously full of confidence,” O’Neill joked to reporters. “And I think you could see that, scoring a second. I’m not renowned as a goal scorer either, so it was pretty crazy.”

There were eerie similarities to O’Neill’s first goal on Wednesday night. In December, the midfielder enjoyed a wonderful give-and-go with Richard van der Venne before coolly finishing. This time, he played a one-two with Valon Berisha and lashed home.

“It just happened really quickly,” he said. “I just saw myself in that space, I took a good first touch. Similar to the first goal, I had a good first touch and it just opened everything up for me.”

The pitch invasion cast a shadow on the season and hovered over both clubs for more than three months. “It’s been been quite weird to be honest,” O’Neill said. “I don’t know whether they should have given us the three points but we’ve done what we needed to do.”

O’Neill credits his oft-forgotten first strike for kick-starting his