Temperatures soared over 35 degrees Celsius at the 3 o'clock kick-off time, and despite multiple drinks breaks throughout the match, United's players succumbed to the intense heat off the back of an away trip to New Zealand last week.

United coach Njegosh Popovich was reluctant to completely blame the heat, acknowledging both sides had to endure the same conditions.

However with midfielder Hayley Taylor-Young suffering heat exhaustion, Popovich did urge the A-Leagues to review the summer fixture, particularly with the season set to extend to 22 rounds next season.

"There needs to be something that gets sorted out for this because definitely it's not healthy," he said.

"This will take two weeks for some players to recover and some will recover quicker than others, but we have to look at healthy and safety aspects and our duty of care.

"One million per cent, that's something the A-Leagues have to look at."

Veteran defender Ellie Brush said the "embarrassing", "nightmare" of a defeat was a "low point" of her career at United, with two 5-0 losses in as many weeks, but echoed Popovich's concern over the season schedule.

"It's stupid and awful out there," she said. "The schedule is hard. We don't have enough time on the training paddock to get quality tactical sessions in and playing at 3 o'clock in the summer, it's ridiculous.

"It's meant to be a winter sport that's for sure. It takes away from the quality.

"Certainly if we go to a longer season it needs to be looked at and hopefully it is because it's tough conditions. But night games would be fine. There are other options."

Even without Matildas star Chloe Logarzo, it only took five minutes for Western United to find the back of the net and the floodgates opened in a lethargic first-half defensive display from the women in green.

After Danielle Steer's first A-League Women goal, less than 10 minutes later she provided an assist for teammate Mel Taranto to get her first too.

Mistakes at the back, combined with a flat-footed Chloe Lincoln sitting high led to Hannah Keane pouncing on the goalkeeper out of position and scoring the visitors' third.

Keane then had her second with an impressive 20-metre solo run, out-muscling Brush before a neat finish between Lincoln's legs.

Sydney Cummings then rubbed salt in the wound, finishing the crumbs of a cross bobbled by Lincoln on the goal-line just before half-time.

Canberra had an improved performance in the second half, producing more shots in the final third, holding possession more confidently, and they were less generous in defence.

But there would be no fairytale comeback.

Western United were just a class above and showed why they're rightly title favourites, handing Canberra their biggest loss at home since Sydney FC beat them 4-0 in 2020.

The result is United's second back-to-back defeat of the season and it's a startling slide, as it was only a few weeks ago Canberra were seemingly on the rise again.

In New Zealand they copped a shock 5-0 defeat to cellar dwellers Wellington Phoenix, and another heavy loss at home will surely send Popovich back to the drawing board looking for answers.

There's still plenty of games left for Canberra to get their season on track but they'll need to make up a lot of points to get back into finals contention.

Hurting United after the last two weeks is the 10-0 points difference, so they'll be hoping a few of the top teams stumble to give them a boost too.

"It's going to be a tougher run now into the finals, so now every game is a grand final," Popovich said.

"There's no team that's easy and Wellington proved that last week."

Western United 5 bt Canberra United 0