Adelaide United 1 Newcastle Jets 0: Champions finally back to winning ways

Defending A-League champions Adelaide United earned their first win in five games as Marcelo Carrusca's penalty gave them a 1-0 win over Newcastle Jets at Coopers Stadium.

After shipping five goals at home to Perth Glory last week, Adelaide returned to form with a victory that puts them eight-points adrift of what remains an unlikely Finals series berth.

The goalkeepers seemed determined to keep it a low scoring affair, with John Hall's commitment to the cause highlighted when he collided with the post after backtracking to claw Morten Nordstrand's looping header away in the first half.

But the game burst to life after the restart, Carrusca nodding wide as the Jets tried to weather Adelaide's pressure, but it eventually told.

A lovely sweeping move saw Tarek Elrich burst into the box and go down under a challenge from Nigel Boogard, Carrusca rolling the resulting penalty into the bottom-left corner.

Both sides were lucky to finish the game with 11 men when Ma Leilei and Riley McGree were only shown yellow cards for separate studs-up tackles, the latter sparking a mass confrontation between the two sets of players.