One of the biggest home and away fixtures for Wangaratta City FC ended on a sour note, as the division one men’s team fell to Myrtleford Savoy in their much-anticipated derby showdown.

Played at Savoy Park in greasy and wet conditions on Sunday, the Devils went down 0-3 to last season's league champions.

The Devils started off well, but soon found themselves on the back foot after Myrtleford’s William Osborn snuck one past Wangaratta goalie Nathan Gleeson in the 12th minute.

Wangaratta reset, stopping the bleeding and re-establishing control in their own half and fighting in the midfield.

After coming out of the break 0-1 down, the Devils knew they had to play riskier in order to force an equaliser.

Unfortunately, the high-risk, high-reward style allowed Savoy to counterpunch on the break, with Connor Caponecchia striking true in the 75th and 88th minutes.

Devils coach Vitaly Leschen said the team lost the game trying to win it.

“When you go in at half-time 0-1 down to Myrtleford or a good team, you make your life hard,” he said.

“Both of their goals [in the second half] were from us trying to get back into the game.

“We took a risk and it didn’t pay off, but that’s alright.

“Reflecting on it, last year we went there and both times we played Myrtleford we tried from the first minute to limit damage and stay in the game as long as possible, whereas this year we went there and tried to win – even when we were 0-1 down we tried to win, even when we were 0-2 down we tried to win.

“That’s a positive sign of how far the team’s come and shows our change in mentality of what we’re trying to achieve game by game against these top teams.”

Goalkeeper Nathan Gleeson was kept busy all day, and made some truly spectacular saves to prevent the margin from blowing out late in the game.

“He’s a very good goalkeeper,” Leschen said.

“There was one save he pulled off, our whole crowd erupted off the save and I didn’t react, because it’s genuinely such a common outcome from him facing shots, I thought it was a pretty standard save for Gleeso.

“He’s a very good addition, a very good keeper, and a very good part of our team.

“Lorenzo [Cecchini] and Stoych [Ivanov] played well, Connor Delaney coming into the team played pretty well for his first senior start of the year.

“Justin [Cirillo] in the guts worked quite well.

“If you ask the boys, most of them would be a bit disappointed with their 1v1 battles and how they went.”

The Devils sit in the middle of the pack after round nine with three wins, three losses and two drawn results.

They face Cobram (fourth) and St Pats (eighth) in the run up to the King’s Birthday bye weekend.

“It’s still been a pretty positive start to the year for us, and if we can pick up a result against Cobram and St Pats going into the second half of the year, we’re still shaping up quite well,” Leschen said.

In other matches, the reserve men won 2-1, the over 35s got up 3-1, while the thirds had a scoreless draw.

The division two women enjoyed the week off with the scheduled bye.