A missing star for one side, an absolute star for the other

Sydney FC’s Simon Colosimo tackles Gold Coast United’s Jason Culina during round 23 of the A-League at the Sydney Football Stadium, Sydney, Jan. 17, 2009. AAP Image/Dean Lewins

If anyone needed a reminder of just how important Alex Brosque is to Sydney’s title aspirations, then they got it in a big way on Sunday evening.

For the second week in a row the competition leaders were missing their season’s front third inspiration and for the second week in a row they were totally devoid of spark or penetration.

Just how much of a difference does Brosque make to this Sydney outfit?

Before this game I would have said 20 to 30 percent.

Now, try 40 or 50 percent, at least.

Certainly Vitezslav Lavicka had the demeanour of a shot man in the post match press conference, seemingly bereft of ideas and solutions to his front third ills.

The reality? Minus Brosque, there aren’t many solutions, and John Aloisi and Mark Bridge again failed to offer anything like the requisite movement and command required to maintain Sydney’s status at the head of the table.

There was a bit made of Aloisi’s “hard work” after this match, but the reality is he is not paid the big dollars to work hard and put himself about.

Lavicka has been nursing him through the last year of his contract, but surely now the claims of youngsters like Chris Payne and Kerem Bulut, the Youth League’s leading scorer, are becoming harder to ignore.

Bridge, meanwhile, is proving enigmatic and might need another public rocket from John Kosmina.

When I asked Lavicka about his front third solutions, he couldn’t offer much, admitting time and time again that “we missed Alex”.

When I asked about Bulut, the inference was he wasn’t quite ready.

Certainly Lavicka’s use of Hayden Foxe as a late make-shift striker just about summed up his issues.

Undoubtedly it is why he thought long and hard about risking Brosque for this one.

Certainly Miron Bleiberg, understandably upbeat post match, made no secret of his admiration for the missing Sydney striker, mentioning him almost as often as he took a jovial swipe at the assembled scribes.

Indeed, Bleiberg claimed that he changed his tactics only at the last minute, when he realised Brosque wouldn’t be playing.

He claimed he hadn’t planned to start Dino Djulbic at right back, but only decided to do so because “three defenders would be better at defending Aloisi in the air than two”.

Despite having beaten Sydney in all three games this season, he stopped short of describing the clean sweep as “game, set and match”, the line he famously used after the Gold Coast has swept aside Brisbane Roar for the third time on Boxing Day.

The reason?

He had too much respect for a Sydney side they had only managed to beat by the odd goal in all three games, and he knew that they could easily meet again, on a bigger stage, with Brosque in toe.

Bleiberg would also have been philosophical enough to realise that taking Jason Culina out of his starting line up would likely have had the same effect on his side.

Culina, like Brosque for Sydney, like Carlos Hernandez for Melbourne, is the spark that ignites his side, and the Socceroos midfielder gave yet another performance of complete domination here.

“Passionate” was how Bleiberg described it.

Another word would be “breathtaking”.

Cajoling and rousing his team, pestering referee Ben Williams in a Muscat-esque performance, inciting the SFS crowd with a wink and a smile, spending too much time on the floor, Culina was everywhere, demonstrating the kind of non-stop movement that should be watched over and over again by everyone involved in the A-League.

His long switches of play, hitting their mark like Michael Diamond hits his clays, were the stuff of legend.

At half-time I managed to catch up with Mike Salter of The Football Tragic, who made the accurate observation about the lack of off the ball movement in the A-League whenever a team is in possession.

Players of the quality of Brosque and Culina provide this mobility in abundance, and its effectiveness is in its relentlessness.

Undoubtedly Culina has been given the license to roam and do as he wishes by Bleiberg, but watching him, evoking memories of his days as a kid in the NSL, I can’t help but keep thinking how nice it would be for Pim Verbeek to release him of his straight-jacket duties for the Roos.

Certainly, Culina’s performances this season are driving on the rest of this Gold Coast United team, and here there were accomplished displays across the pitch, from Michael Thwaite and Zenon Caravella in midfield, to Bas van den Brink at the back.

Meanwhile, Bleiberg sprung another surprise on the left, starting Tahj Minniecon for James Brown, while Joel Porter got a start in place of Charlie Miller.

The two combined beautifully for the winner, Minniecon ducking in from the left and splitting the right side of Sydney’s defence, an area of weakness I alluded to in my tactical preview. Porter did the rest.

Sure enough, Gold Coast were able to stretch Sydney throughout the game, and break them down, and their constant switching of the play exposed Sydney’s lack of natural width.

Gold Coast are flying, and looking forward to pitting themselves against the Melbourne Victory on January 29, but even the manager admitted that they struggle against direct, physical sides like the Central Coast Mariners, who are their next opponents.

Sydney, meanwhile, will be desperate for Brosque to return and ignite his side.