A resurgent Wellington Phoenix have notched a third straight A-League Men's win to bring newly crowned FFA Cup winners Melbourne Victory back down to earth in Wollongong.
A 74th-minute goal from Reno Piscopo at WIN Stadium secured a 1-0 win for seventh-placed Wellington, who moved within one point of the top six after their first clean sheet of the ALM campaign.
Victory, who were backing up four nights after their cup win, stayed fourth.
It was their first defeat in their last 10 league and cup games and only their second from 15 this season, but have now gone three ALM games without a win.
The goal came from a defensive error by Jason Davidson, who gave the ball away to David Ball who charged into the area to set up Piscopo for his second goal in as many games.
Piscopo's decider came against the run of play following Victory's best spell of the game.
Phoenix goalkeeper Oliver Sail made three good saves in six minutes to deny Ben Folami, Josh Brillante and Marco Rojas, who a few minutes earlier came off the bench to make his 100th appearance for Victory.
Victory coach Tony Popovic felt there were a number of factors why they weren't at their best.
"I think that's always going to be a question, everyone waits to see the result to determine whether there was a hangover (FFA Cup win) or not," Popovic said.
"The conditions were different, we had to travel, it was a heavy pitch, there was a lot of different things today.
"The keeper made some great saves, we should have taken those chances and hit the lead.
"In the second half I don't recall them having a shot on goal so we were good in that second half, but credit to them we made an error and they punished us, so in the end we got what we deserved."
Both teams struggled to create clear cut chances in the first half and lacked polish in the final third, though Phoenix looked more dangerous in the latter stages of the half.
"I thought we played very well with the ball and defended solidly as well," Phoenix coach Ufuk Talay said.
"I think we had close to 57 per cent possession and over 600 passes this game.
"It was an arm wrestle, two teams when (they) got behind the ball, very defensive and I thought one goal was going to win this game and I'm glad that we scored that one goal."
