Wanderers seal return to A-League finals at last with defeat of Victory

After countless squad rebuilds, six years and five permanent managers, the Western Sydney Wanderers have finally sealed their return to the A-League Men finals.

Brandon Borrello led the charge for Marko Rudan’s men, scoring their first-half opener and setting up Amor Layouni’s 81st minute winner in a 2-1 defeat of Melbourne Victory on Saturday.

Rudan becomes the first manager to pilot the Wanderers to a top-six finish since the man in the opposite dugout, Tony Popovic, was in charge of the club.

The turnaround under Rudan has been impressive over the last year, with a slew of smart recruits from home and overseas turning the Wanderers into a team that is combative, entertaining and resilient.

Captain Marcelo, who returns from suspension next week, has been a rock in defence, Brandon Borrello has 11 goals in 24 games and a midfield trio of Morgan Schneiderlin, Calem Nieuwenhof and Milos Ninkovic is the envy of most in the competition.

“The bigger the challenge, the better,” Rudan said. “If we are to improve going forward we need to have a certain mentality every game. There’s still a lot of improvement as far as I’m concerned.

“But at this time of the year, it’s time to take my hat off to a lot of people, particularly my players and my staff for securing finals for this football club for the first time in a long time.

“I’m really happy for everyone involved in the club, it’s been a gigantic effort,” Rudan surmised. “I thought we played some good stuff and really good football.”

Rudan’s sole gripe with the victory was the lack of support for his Wanderers side, whose achievements were watched by a crowd of 10,788 at CommBank Stadium.

“Knowing the position we are in, we just want to secure a home final and I want to