A-League Round Eight Talking Points

Tom C - No argument about Archie's positioning,control,turn & cross and even less for the quality of Carlos' header.Excellent work on all counts.However,I did make the effort to view the goal again twice and do not change my view, if Glen had done what a good defender should have done and crowded Archie out another 4 or 5 yards the goal may have been averted.As it was he was still scrambling across his goal line when the header rocketed past him. Poor decision. Cheers jb

I don't think we're disagreeing on much, to be honest j binnie, but I want to correct you on a couple of points. The only reference I've made to 'magic' on this thread was that Durakovic allowed Thompson to play as a lone striker to 'work his magic'. I did not describe this particular incident as 'magic' although I do think that all three players involved (Celeski, Thompson and Hernandez) did very well and deserve plenty of credit. Secondly, I said goals are 'generally' a combination of good offensive work and bad defending. Obviously sometimes it's only one of those, but 'generally' it's both, in my view. My point regarding Moss was that if you keep putting pressure on a GK, they're likely to make a mistake eventually. I could have expressed that better, I think. In hindsight, I think you make a good point about Moss' work. He should have realised that Hernandez was easily outnumbered and that the real threat was Thompson getting the space to deliver an accurate cross. But I don't agree that that makes the goal any less of an excellent ten-man-team effort, for the reasons I've already stated.

midfielder -Again my apologies for attempting to mislead the public,Sydney City instead of Sydney FC. What a humungous error.I really must see the doctor about my memory ,if I don't watch out I'll find my backward recollection stuck on 2002. By the way did you agree the figures are quite heartening?. Cheers jb

Cattery - A shrewd observation but for your perusal although the average figure per game has dropped from round 1 (as it would and should) the average appears to be leveling off around the 12,500/game since 30/10 when it dropped below 13000 for the first time. This could have been caused by 3 home games with 4 figure crowds for Heart,GCU, & Wellington all happening on the same weekend, Since then, in a 21 game stretch, it has dropped to last week's 12,500. jb

We can say that the fixturing by the FFA, getting as many big games as possible towards the start of the season, has been very successful.

JB LOL Syd City .... hohohohohohho

For those who are interested here are the crowd figures for this season so far compared with last year's averages over 15 games. Victory 27,825 --- 15,057 : Roar 14,895 --- 9,278 : Syd City 13,602 --- 8,014 : Jets 13,111 --- 8,429 : Adelaide 11,366 --- 11,540 : Wellington 9,634 --- 8,106 : Perth 8,932 --- 8,486 : CCM 8,743 --- 7,841: Heart 6,270 --- 8,279 : GCU 4,372 --- 2,623 : As can be seen from these figures eight clubs are showing an increase the exceptions being Adelaide & Heart but it should be remembered Heart's home figure will increase greatly later in the season when they have a derby game against Victory. Adelaide's decrease is marginal and with improved displays their home gates will increase. So all in all so far so good for 2011. jb

Tom C. Goals ----"A combination of good offensive work and bad defending." Don't agree, but get your point. If you say "or" instead of "and" I would agree wholeheartedly. Goals can be created by exceptionally good attacking play OR because a team defends badly. IMO that was what happened in this particular incident that you described as "magic". You start to talk about other instances in the game way outside my comment which was simply that Glen Moss made a fatal error in retreating, allowing Archie, who was still in the penalty area, to turn and pick his target.That was the major error, the other was that Carlos,not a notable aerial finisher was allowed to out jump defenders who in the main were 3 or 4 inches taller than him. That was in no way intended to take away from the quality of the actual header which was top class. Your thoughts on Moss's actions need to be studied. Had he continued to cramp Archie's space, Archie would have been forced to gain space by moving out towards the corner flag.When, and only when, Archie moved out of the penalty area should Glen have thought about his sudden retreat. If he had done this he may have allowed hid defence to do "a Liverpool" and get behind him (Moss) to back-up. Time and space become very important in the penalty area and AT is far too dangerous a character to gift them both on a plate.

Goals are generally a combination of good offensive work and bad defending. And often bad defending comes after a period of sustained team pressure, as it did in this case. It was an ordinary defensive effort by Salley, who was the only defender in a position to get to Thompson's cross. Salley had a poor game. Moss, however, made two excellent saves earlier in the match, against Thompson and Celeski, so I think he should get a pass. My feeling watching the game live (haven't seen the replay) was that Moss didn't want to follow Thompson any wider than he already had. By the time Thompson crossed the ball he wasn't really in a shooting position so it would be natural for the keeper to back towards his own goal. No team can rely on impeccable last ditch defending in every instance, not even Liverpool. Put enough pressure on and the goals will come, and the Victory had had some good chances prior to the winner. Which was a remarkable team effort, with only ten men.

Tom C -The Victory winner came from a nice AT cross and a forceful header from Carlos. If you get a chance to see it again you will note two strange occurrences..(1) Glen Moss the GCU keeper rushed out to "hold" Archie who was still within the penalty area and then for some inexplicable reason backed right off and allowed AT to turn and pick his spot for his cross. (2) Carlos,not the most agile of players in the Victory team ,"soared" above defenders,most of whom could give him 3 or 4 inches when standing. Magic?, yes if you are a Victory fan no doubt,- if a student of the game, "atrocious defending". Now I don't know if you watched the Liverpool v Manchester City game on the same weekend where Reina charged out of the goal and "spread" himself in front of an advancing forward forcing him to choose a direction left or right.. Reina remained goalside making the forward go wider until he was forced to do something.By that time 3 Liverpool defenders were stretched across the goal-line & easily cleared the threat.Classic defending. Miron should make it compulsory viewing for his team this week.Strange game football everyone notices different things. jb

And yet none from open play against MV...

Total of 58k odd at an average of 11,600 per game - that ain't too bad. You're not going to get blockbusters every single round.

Must admit I was surprised to see a team goal from Victory. Brisbane must be rubbing off on them. We had four of them on the weekend, and yes all from open play.

No BES. I'm revealing the fault in the attitude that a lot of other people take. You won't win games just by having the best structure, and you won't win games by having the best players. You win games by finding the best structure and gameplan for the players you have, and executing it. Hence 'maximising the talents of the players that were out there'. There's no irony in that at all. Of course, you can also pick the players to suit the gameplan, which was what Durakovic did when he took out Kewell and Rojas to give the midfield a bit more flexibility, and allow Thompson to work his magic up front.

Poor crowds, apart from Brisbane and to a lesser extent Melbourne Victory. Should improve next week though.

TomC - do you see the irony in your final comment tho re MV ..."The team was set up to maximise the talents of the players that were out there....". You are exactly right of course - and you reveal the inherit fault in what MV is attempting to do at the same time.

Brisbane are simply outstanding. Not only are they unbeaten in 36 matches, but they've scored in every one of them. I'm still sure that they'll lose at some pont this season but I have no idea when that will be or who it will be against. After 3 straight wins, the wheels are falling off for Perth. Given how close the A-League is, they're still in a good position but need to turn it around pretty quickly. Adelaide look awful. For all the hype over their new signings, they haven't replaced Flores at all and it shows. Newcastle finally broke their run of away defeats. They're very Jekyll and Hyde, brilliant at home but very average away. Still that sequence would be enough for a top 6 spot. Central Coast are shaping up as the main challengers to the Roar, after a slow start. The fact they have a relatively unchanged squad from last year, and Amini's return from injury, has helped and they look like taking 2nd spot, though it's still very early. The Heart showed some decent signs and it's no shame losing to CCM at Gosford. Yet again SFC give up an early lead before coming back late, and like last week we couldn't make up the deficit. For all the talk about us learning to start better, we don't seem to have learned anything. I think our system is too predictable. It's the same every week and we seem to be getting results based on individual brilliance (i.e. Nicky Carle) rather than Lavicka's tactics. With a game against the Roar next week, the heat could be seriously turned up on lavicka. If the Phoenix can perform like that at home more often then the'll be competitive again this season. They've done well given all the turmoil of the off-season. Just as the criticism of the Victory was way too premature last week, we shouldn't be rushing to praise them now. The league is so close that a loss next week can put them out of the finals spots. We really need to wait until 15 or so rounds in to start making judgements, though the media does need something to talk about until then. Gold Coast have been a bit unlucky this season. They've been very competitive in most games but just can't quite get the results that they need. I'm not sure if it's a lack of luck or a lack of quality (maybe both) but their effort is there and, if they can maintain it, they'll do OK. Not finalsits but they won't be last by 10 points either.

The Victory's winner was, in fact, a great team goal. Thompson was put into great position by the excellent work of Billy Celeski, and it came after a period of sustained pressure, which came after Durakovic finished making his subs and resettling the team's structure. No mean feat, when you consider that three of the back four were being played out of position, simply due to lack of alternatives. Durakovic deserves plenty of credit for that win. Also worth noting that the Victory were 2-0 up before they went a man down. Frankly, the idea that individual star power played a bigger part than coaching or tactical direction is ridiculous. The team was set up to maximise the talents of the players that were out there.