A-League serves up a ‘Super Sunday’

Roar Guru

By apaway, 8 Mar 2010 apaway is a Roar Guru

Tagged:: A-League, a-league finals, football, Melbourne Victory, Newcastle Jets, Sydney FC, Wellington Phoenix

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It hasn’t been the best of weeks for the A-League, with the possible implosion of the North Queensland Fury, and the scheduling nightmare that sees Melbourne Victory playing twice in three days.

But the two finals matches played on Sunday might have put a smile on A-League chief Ben Buckley’s face…. if only temporarily. For Wellington-Newcastle and Sydney-Melbourne put on two of the best finals games in the A-League’s short history, back-to-back, in front of big, noisy crowds. Both went to extra time, both took fans on a roller-coaster ride, with goals, near misses, passion and controversy.

New Zealand football just marches on. With almost 33,000 in the “Cake Tin”, Ricky Herbert’s Phoenix continued to rewrite one of the most unique stories in world club football. After abject failures for football franchises in Auckland in both the NSL and the A-League, Wellington has emerged as a stronghold. It would take a brave person to declare that a Melbourne-Sydney final is a foregone conclusion. Wellington’s extra time 3-1 win over the Jets might be a boon for trans-Tasman airline services as the “Yellow Fever” looks to come and make some noise on the east coast next week (and maybe the week after).

What IS a foregone conclusion, and which may have slipped most fans’ notice, is that Melbourne and Sydney are now confirmed as the A-League’s two representatives in next year’s Asian Champions League. For even if the Phoenix were to beat Sydney next week and then go on to win the Grand Final, they can’t play in the ACL. That’s the uniqueness of their situation – they play in a league which is not in their “home” confederation.

Given all they have achieved in the last two seasons, that anomaly seems like a shame. I can’t think of another club side in the world that faces the same issue. In the meantime, the Phoenix continue to live up to their nickname. How much further can they rise?

Melbourne Victory didn’t quite live up to their nickname on the day, but they did over the two legs of their major semi-final with Sydney FC, with the 2-2 draw enough for the Victory to host the decider.

This was the best finals game ever; a showcase of attacking football between the A-League’s fiercest rivals. It might have all been very different if Tom Pondeljak’s goal line handball in the first minute had not been missed by the match officials. Ernie Merrick showed his frustration with another incorrect Archie Thompson offside call by berating the referee at halftime, but perhaps if he’d seen the Pondeljak incident he might have remained his introspective self.

Clint Bolton will probably feel he got his hands in the wrong place for Melbourne’s first goal, even though Robbie Kruse’s shot was a screamer. But from then on, the FC keeper was brilliant, and it leaves me scratching my head as to why Sydney have let him leave at the end of the season. He has been the league’s best goalkeeper this season by a fair distance.

The A-League has had its problems in Version 5. One weekend won’t fix those, but many more like ‘Super Sunday’ won’t hurt.

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The Crowd Says (19) | Page 1 of Comments

Australian Football said | March 8th 2010 @ 7:07am | Report comment

Unfortunately for me I only managed to see the SFC v Melb fixture and my thoughts are that SFC were robbed. Archie’s late winner was clearly offside—-yet again, another poor decision made by the linesman.

~~~~~~
AF

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- Midfielder said | March 8th 2010 @ 10:44am | Report comment
  
  Kama remember Kossie’s killers at BT.
  
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- Al said | March 8th 2010 @ 1:58pm | Report comment
  
  Absolutely not offside.
  Melbourne had four phantom offsides including one which would have sent Thompson one on one with the keeper if the assistant’s flag wasn’t incorrectly raised.
  
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- TomF said | March 8th 2010 @ 1:58pm | Report comment
  
  @ Australian Football,
  
  as a neutral watching the game there is NO WAY Thompson was offside for the winner. In fact, he was over two metres onside at the time the free kick was taken (for whatever reason it was given). The fact is, that he started is run from in front of Sydney’s wall and no-one, yes not one of Sydney’s defenders tracked him- they were all caught ball-watching. It was a shockingly poor piece of set-piece defending and on that basis, Sydney deserved the final result. They will have to lift their game against Wellington next week to make the Grand Final – I can’t imagine the Phoenix will not have noted how static Sydney are at set pieces!
  
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LeftArmSpinner said | March 8th 2010 @ 7:46am | Report comment

most telling thing of all of this soccer stuff. went to the tahs match, in the members, with my son and several of his friends. all good rugby players and two of them in the elite prog. for ARU. Guess where they were going on the next day? to the soccer to sit in the cove and get the buzz of the crowd!!!!

needless to say, despite the tahs “win” they left the the Tahs game empty and bored and came away from the soccer envigorated and entertained even tho heir team had lost!

Apologies to my soccer brethren. I hope you take this as a complimenbt! thats how it is meant.

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- Rob said | March 8th 2010 @ 8:41am | Report comment
  
  All good Spinner, thats a huge compliment…..hope the Tahs can start running the ball for you.
  
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apaway said | March 8th 2010 @ 8:10am | Report comment

A Correction: I stated in the article that at half time Ernie Merrick protested an incorrect Archie Thompson offside call. Clearly, that couldn’t be possible, given Thompson didn’t take the field until the 60th minute, and not even Archie Thompson can be offside while sitting on the bench, can he? I assume Merrick must have been voicing his displeasure at the penalty awarded to Sydney. He probably should have watched the video first.

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- Australian Football said | March 8th 2010 @ 8:22am | Report comment
  
  Archie ia a serial offside player—even when he sits on the bench—no need to apologise for a correct assumption.
  
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MartyB said | March 8th 2010 @ 8:21am | Report comment

http://www.goal.com/en/news/14/asia/2009/12/17/1692374/afc-a-leagues-wellington-phoenix-can-play-in-the-asian-cl

Actually Phoenix have been granted dispensation to play in the ACL by the AFC, until 2012. So Melbourne haven’t booked anything yet.

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- apaway said | March 8th 2010 @ 10:27am | Report comment
  
  Thanks for that Marty. Interseting that the article brings into question all A-League clubs participation in the ACL from 2012 on. This surely must be a unique occurrence in world football.
  
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MV Dave said | March 8th 2010 @ 8:52am | Report comment

Two brilliant games with excellent crowds, noisy and involved, matches that went down to the wire, great goals, magnificent saves and high drama…and guess what? It is our own league…the A League…for all its critics just sit down and have a look at what excitement and excellent football can be delivered when people get off the high horses (Euro snobs mainly) and support the local version of the world game. Just 5 shorts years ago this wasnt possible…lets hope this Super Sunday is a catalyst for more of the same. Oh and BTW Go VIctoreeeeee

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- Joe FC said | March 8th 2010 @ 4:43pm | Report comment
  
  Well said Dave (except I’ll be in despair if Melb do win the championship).
  
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Midfielder said | March 8th 2010 @ 10:42am | Report comment

Two great games …

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jimbo said | March 8th 2010 @ 11:31am | Report comment

“near sellout”
The game was a sellout with all tickets sold a week before.

The attendance didn’t reach the 35K capacity, because some RU members didn’t use their seats.

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jimbo said | March 8th 2010 @ 11:52am | Report comment

Two fantastic games of football yesterday and a credit to the FFA and the A-League and the growing stature and standard of the game here and in NZ.

In some ways the Wellington game was bigger and better atmosphere, but great game against Melbourne at the SFS with the wrong result unfortunately and another GF at Etihad.

MVDave,
Doesn’t mean Victory are going to win the GF – no AU this time – its Sydney or Phoenix, who have both beaten MV convincingly this season at Etihad.

We just get an extra game to go and see live here in Sydney while you guys get fat and lazy

The Sydney v Wellington will be a beauty too next week and looking forward to it – the winner will be a worthy opponent for the Golden Toilet Seat decider.

Contoversy regarding the 2nd ACL spot with MV claiming it already – saying the Nix are ineligible because of the AFC ruling on them not being an Australian club.

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- apaway said | March 8th 2010 @ 1:28pm | Report comment
  
  MartyB cleared the ACL issue with a link to an article from last year. The Victory can’t really approach it by saying Wellington aren’t an Australian club. There are lots of examples of clubs from one country playing in a league in another, especially in the UK. But I’m still to find an example of a club that plays in a competition in an entirely different FIFA confederation from that they are from.
  
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  - jimbo said | March 8th 2010 @ 1:37pm | Report comment
    
    Thanks apaway.
    
    Anyone know the “official ruling” on this?
    
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- Tom said | March 8th 2010 @ 10:41pm | Report comment
  
  Long time since Sydney beat Melbourne at Etihad. Last two games Melbourne were clearly the stronger team.
  
  Phoenix haven’t beat Melbourne at Etihad. A 1-1 draw last year and a 4-0 drubbing to the Victory earler this year.
  
  Still, grand final will be a different matter. Crowd will be twice as big as any of those games, for one thing.
  
  Not sure about that Goal article concering the Phoenix and the ACL. There are plenty of articles out there that contradict it. Apparently it has something to do with their agreement of affiliation.
  
  http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/news/970775/phoenix-demand-answers
  
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Joel said | March 8th 2010 @ 3:17pm | Report comment

whats up with the kiwi commentators, they seem to think its the FFA who are threatening to kick them out of HAL.

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