Both sides claimed the psychological high ground after Adelaide United and Melbourne Victory played out a turgid 0-0 draw in the A-League's major semi-final first leg at Hindmarsh Stadium.

Adelaide needs only a score draw at Telstra Dome next weekend to advance to the grand final, but Melbourne was glad to have snapped a two-game losing sequence and will back itself to overwhelm United in front of a raucous crowd of 50,000.

To do that the Victory will need a lift in attacking intent, as the home side was dominant everywhere but the scoreboard, Melbourne sitting deep and riding out a sea of crosses delivered by Adelaide's wingers.

Melbourne barely had a genuine chance the whole game and each time it threatened a breakaway through its attacking trio of Fred, Danny Allsopp or Archie Thompson, United's central pair of Michael Valkanis and Ang Costanzo were on hand to scotch it.

Neither goalkeeper was stretched into a genuinely difficult save, though United's Brazilian striker Fernando came agonisingly close when his first half header grazed the cross bar.

United coach John Kosmina said his side would journey to Telstra Dome in Melbourne with momentum and argued the Victory would be second-guessing itself.

"No goals against was a positive and the way we played was even more positive, it was a fantastic performance ... we stopped them playing," Kosmina said.

"We went out there in a good frame of mind, Melbourne I think are probably more worried about how they'd gone the last few weeks and they've got more to worry about after today." Melbourne coach Ernie Merrick, however, argued forcefully that any coach would take a nil-nil result with the knowledge of a home fixture to come.

"We got what we wanted to get, we wanted to get to the Dome next week in front of 50,000 needing a win," he said.

"It's always hard on Adelaide's ground to get a result." In the fourth minute Travis Dodd's cutback was blazed wastefully over the bar by Diego when it might have been easier to score, and in the 50th a fizzing cross travelled tantalisingly across an open Melbourne goal but no United player was able to get the crucial touch.

Nathan Burns headed wide and Fernando frightened the Victory with a looping effort that provided the closest glimpse of goal for a crowd of 15,575.

United was only given 20 minutes by former Champions League combatant Bobby Petta, who injured a foot in the warm-up and hobbled off to be replaced by the similarly creative Jason Spagnuolo.

Kosmina conceded that his men would need to be a little more selfish when attacking the goalmouth next week, as attempts to pass the ball into the net amounted to nothing.

"We got into the penalty area 27 times, we probably need to be a little hungrier in front of goals, taking a bit of a chance," he said.

"We had an opportunity in the first half where Jason could've shot, he laid it off to Ross and he could've had a dig, those chances you've got to take."

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