Melbourne Victory have put their finals hopes in serious jeopardy after only managing a 1-1 draw against Newcastle Jets on Sunday afternoon.

In a game where Melbourne Victory were heavy favourites, the pressure was on for the navy blue to deliver but it was the Jets who looked more dangerous at the outset.

In the final ten minutes of the first half, Thomas Deng’s blunder led to Leonardo Santiago racing through on goal and he managed to find Ryan Kitto to open the scoring 1-0.

Tempers frayed as Daniel Mullen received his second yellow card for a challenge on Ollie Bozanic with the Jets reduced to 10-men.

The extra man didn’t seem to help in the second half. Six minutes into the second half Enver Alivodic managed to cut inside the box and strike the post and it looked like Victory were hanging on for dear life.

Five minutes later, Matthieu Delpierre’s long ball managed to find Besart Berisha who calmly chested it down and equalised, however replays showed Berisha was clearly offside.

At 1-1, Victory suddenly had all the momentum however they looked slow with their transition.

With 15 minutes remaining Morten Nordstrand was in behind the defence and passed Thomas but his shot only found the side netting.

For the final minutes Victory kept finding their way in behind the defence but it ended in a stalemate. In an extremely winnable game for Victory they only salvaged a point and return for an almighty challenge against the highflying Western Sydney Wanderers next week.

Melbourne Victory: 20. THOMAS Lawrence, 2. GERIA Jason, 3. GALLOWAY Scott 6. BROXHAM Leigh, 7. FINKLER Gui, 8. BERISHA Besart, 9. BARBAROUSES Kosta (79’ 19. HOWARD George), 13. BOZANIC Ollie, 17. DELPIERRE Matthieu, 23. INGHAM Jai (67’ 10. THOMPSON Archie), 24. DENG Thomas (45’ 22. MAKAROUNAS Jesse)

Newcastle Jets: 1. BIRIGHITTI Mark, 2. MULLEN Daniel, 3. HOFFMAN Jason, 4. BOOGARD Nigel, 7. ALIVODIC Enver (83’ 6. WATSON Cameron), 8. POLJAK Mateo (22. JACKSON Lachlan), 10. SANTIAGO Leonardo, 16. UGARKOVIC Steven, 19. NORDSTRAND Morten, 24. COWBURN Nicholas, 28. KITTO Ryan (43’ 5. KANTAROVSKI Ben)

Referee: Chris Beath

Attendance: 14383