DESPITE being reduced to 10 men after a red card in the second half, Panorama FC was still able to start their Bathurst District Football men’s first grade season with a come from behind 4-3 win over City Colts on Sunday.

After going down 2-0 in the space of 20 minutes at Proctor Park, Panorama fought back in a heated encounter that saw Jonny Hankel sent off for fighting in the 70th minute.

At that point Panorama were 3-2 up, and while being one player short for the final 20 minutes, they still continued to assert their dominance in the match.

Mitch Curran scored a hat-trick in a losing side while Jaiden Culbert bagged a double for Panorama.

“The comeback from the boys was great. I knew if we were to put the ball on the ground, pass it around up front, we had the strike power up there with Jaiden Culbert and Jacob Soetens to cause problems. That was evident there with our four goals,” Panorama captain Beau Yates said.

“Jacob’s a great signing for us. He scored 17 goals last year I think and we scored 22 all up, so that speaks for itself. Jaiden also coming into the team for us will be great.

“Once we settled down I knew we wouldn’t have any trouble moving through them. There was plenty of space there in the midfield that the boys were able to exploit and go forward with.”

Panorama looked the stronger side in the opening exchanges of the round one match, but after five minutes and against the run of play Colts went 1-0 up.

An inch-perfect long ball from Mitch Bestwick down the middle of the field found Curran, who made no mistake by steering his shot around Panorama goalkeeper Ryan Ellis.

Curran had several efforts blocked by Ellis shortly after, while in turn Panorama’s Trent Baker and Culbert each had attempted denied by Thomas Hopkins in the Colts goal.

When Curran picked up his second goal to make it 2-0 Colts enjoyed a brief period of dominance, marked by two narrow misses from Nathan Shurmer and Jye Fleischmann.

But Panorama then scored against the run of play as Culbert capitalised after a strong Soetens burst down the right wing.

James Cox then found the mark with a chip shot over Hopkins five minutes before half-time to ensure things were square at the break.

The second half saw Colts struggle to push through their midfield and Panorama took advantage to score 10 minutes in.

Soetens’ first attempt was blocked, but he followed up to put his side ahead for the first time.

The tight nature of the contest – which was also very physical – soon saw tensions boil over.

Colts’ Aaron Paterson made contact with Hankel while trying to win the ball, with the latter shown a red card when he retaliated.

Down a man Panorama still managed to extend their lead to 4-2 as Culbert bagged his second.

While Curran made it a hat-trick with a simple header in the dying seconds of the match, the honours belonged to Panorama.

“Once we got in front we tried to push the ball forward too fast. We weren’t defensively minded enough,” Colts captain Shurmer said.

“They scored some very good goals though. They’re a very strong unit and very hard to stop. We’ll still take a lot of positives out of the game. Close game. We could have won it, but that’s how it goes sometimes.”

PANORAMA FC 4 (Jaiden Culbert 2, James Cox, Jacob Soetens) defeated BATHURST CITY COLTS 3 (Mitch Curran 3)