By Peter Kambounias

Sydney Olympic and Sydney United battled out a scoreless draw at Belmore Sports Ground in the final premiership round and the result was enough for Olympic to finish in third spot and enough for United to finish in 5th spot.

News had filtered through from Cromer Park that Macarthur Rams stole a 2-2 draw against Manly United thus allowing Olympic to keep third place and the double chance in the first week of the semi finals.

The results also meant that Sydney Olympic has won the Club Championship for 2008 - a massive club achievement.

Olympic now will travel to John Crehan Park at Cringila to face the Wollongong Wolves after the date with Bankstown City in the 2008 Tiger Turf Cup Final at Seymour Shaw Park.

Sydney United breathed a sigh of relief after their point was all that was needed to nudge out APIA Leichhardt Tigers who had defeated Penrith Nepean United at CUA Stadium but the 4-3 scoreline was not enough to overhaul Sydney United on goal difference.

Coming into the game all the talk was concerning how many goals Olympic would rack up against the depleted United side and how many goals Sutherland can knock past the Wolves for Olympic to jump into second place.   In order for that to happen the goal gap of five had to be bridged.

Olympic's starting line up was changed from the APIA game.  Chris Triantis, Peter Zorbas and James Kovas started while Milorad Simonovic, Nathan Sherlock and Matthew Mayora started on the bench.

Things looked very bright for Olympic in the first thirty seconds of the game.  Chris Triantis was put through on the right inside pocket and he cut back for Kovas who hesitated slightly instead of shooting thus allowing United keeper Vedran Janjetovic to steal the ball at Kovas' feet.  Olympic had hit the ground running.

In the 5th Olympic came close again.  Shannon Cole's free kick from the left speared dangerously towards goal and it was headed off the line by Joe Vrkic.

To United's credit they fought back by stacking the midfield and coming up trumps with most 50/50 balls.  Also helping was Olympic who seemed lethargic from the midweek APIA game on the strength-sapping mud.  United began to glide past the Olympic midfield men and enjoyed good chances through Elsid Barkhousir's header over the bar in the 14th and Ivo Bosnar's free kick that zipped past Sam Emmanouil's right post in the 18th.  Sydney United were comfortable on the ball whereas Olympic were the opposite.

Olympic's below-par showing would have been a dissapointment for one of the biggest home crowds seen at Belmore in 2008.  The fans were looking for someone from Olympic to spark up the game.

Howerver United were unphased and Emmanouil was called upon to save at the feet of the nippy Luka Glavas on twenty minutes.

At the other end and six minutes later Olympic missed the chance of the first half.  Kovas found himself with only the United keeper to beat but his close range shot went straight to Janjetovic to the amazement of all the spectators at the ground.

After the game Kovas was still very dissapointed with the chance he blew.  United pushed on and had the bulk of the remainder of the first half.

In the 28th Barkhousir clattered into Zorbas from behind and the foul brought on a bad injury to Zorby's knee cruciate ligament.  Zorbas was assisted from the field and he was replaced by Simonovic.

Emmanouil had to do some more work against Glavas in the 32nd in what was proving a good hitout for the understudy to Michael Herbet who sat out again due to a back strain.

At half time Milan Blagojevic was forced to make a second substitution with Emmanuel Zunino coming off for Nathan Sherlock.  Zunino suffered an achilles heel injury.

Both sides tried desperately to get the game into gear after the break.  Glavas was doing his best up front for the visitors but the Olympic defence held well.  One such occasion saw Olympic's man of the match Matthew Jurman shuffle Glavas off the ball within dangerous range on goal in the 58th.

The move looked to have sparked Olympic into life, with Anthony Hartshorn cranking up the pace on the left flank, but the little things were still not going Olympic's way.

Hartshorn headed a Cole free kick over the bar in the 72nd in a sneak preview of what was to come.  Simonovic tried a long ranger in the 82nd that sailed over the bar.

Kovas' big miss in the first half was replicated by Hartshorn in the 83rd.  Simonovic and Cole played a neat one-two, Simonovic found Triantis free on the right.  He beat his opponent around the outside and popped in a brilliant cross met by Hartshorn just a metre or so out from goal.  Hartshorn headed downward but right onto Janjetovic's right hand and the ball bounced off the ground and back into the keeper's hands.  It was proof that the ball just didn't want to play according to Olympic's script.

SYDNEY OLYMPIC 0 DREW WITH SYDNEY UNITED 0 at Belmore Sports Ground.

SYDNEY OLYMPIC: Sam Emmanouil, Emmanuel Zunino (46' Nathan Sherlock), Mirko Jurilj, Matthew Jurman, Anthony Hartshorn, Roger Galayini, Chris Triantis, Anthony Doumanis, Peter Zorbas (33' Milorad Simonovic), Shannon Cole, James Kovas (74' Siraj Al Tall)