Roar eye another home grand final

Of course, if you're Arsene Wenger you learn that 4-0 can be a dangerous score. 12 months ago, Arsenal went 0-4 up away to Newcastle in the EPL after just 26 mins. They were still 0-4 up with 22 mins to play. Final score? Newcastle United 4 - 4 Arsenal :-)

Nathan, the mariners once overturned a 3-0 deficit at Hindmarsh(for a 3-3 finish) to the great shock of us locals....still at least our wasn't in a GF in front of 40k fans eh;)

That night still irks me no end:( From Vidmars's profligacy infront of goal to the crowd getting ahead of itsel and singing Que Sera Sera etc and of course the serial Pest himself, what a horrible night, no wonder both the great J.Warren (and not so great me) cried at the sound of the ref's final whistle that night. The Australian Fanzine Studs Up went with just a black cover for the December 1997 issue so distraught were we all. I hate 2-0, it still gives me the Heebee Jeebies.

Some of us have learned not to trust 3-nil either ...

The actual figure for that game as given out at the time was 25,168. jb

Any AUS football fan, who was alive on 29 November 1997, would understand the implications of a football scoreline of 2-0. If you can't remember that far back, cast your mind to 13 March 2011 at Lang Park: 3 minutes to play in the HAL Grand Final & the score is 2-0 ... 180 seconds later things had changed dramatically. And, if you can't remember that far back, cast your mind to last Friday, 30 March 2012. Nix are 2-0 up with 10 minutes to play in their Elimination final ... again, 180 seconds later the score had changed dramatically. "Two-nil" ... the most dangerous score in football.

I'm clearly not as old as you, but in my 20 years of watching football (though I'm not really sure what that has to do with anything - I would respect your opinion anyway), I'd rather be 2-0 up going into the 2nd leg than 1-0 up. Particularly at a ground where Roar have never lost and usually score at least 1 goal at. All Roar have to do is score and thus tie is over. That wouldn't be the case at 1-0. You're right though, just my opinion

There is a strange phenomenon being ignored here by most writers. This Roar team is far from the finished article and if Ange is the coach I think he is he will be well aware of where improvements can be made. Has anyone stopped to think what will happen in next years competition should he sign a few more players of the quality of Berisha and Adnan. The mind boggles, and, now being backed by an Asian consortium with a huge range of contacts in the game,and one must assume, a huge desire to succeed in Asia, Ange could continue to improve his Roar side , to what level?????. jb

That's alright mate, you acknowledged it in your reply that it might be a selfish POV and I think you might find yourself on your Pat Malone there. Imagine if in bizarro-world AUFC won a couple of HAL titles whilst MVC languished at the bottom end of the table, I think there'd be a riot in old Batmania;) From my personal POV I'm happy for MVC to be a basket case for a while as we look to re-balance the ledger from the Muscat era of domination over the Reds!

Fair enough - that's your opinion. My opinion is that in a 2-leg final if the first leg ends: a) 1-0, the away team has a distinct advantage b) 2-0, evenly poised c) winning margin 2 goals or less & away team scores, away team distinct advantage d) all other scores, home team distinct advantage Again, this is just my observation from watching football for the past 30 years.

Kasey - from a purely selfish & personal point of view - I'd be happy to finish bottom of the table for the next 2 years & win zero games ... if it means I get to see Harry Kewell playing 30 more times in Melbourne for MVFC. Hopefully, I'll be around for at least 40 more HAL seasons and I hope MVFC get things right on the park before my time is up. However, the pure joy I've received this year from watching Australia's most successful, highest profile & most technically-gifted footballer are memories that I will take to my grave and no HAL trophies can ever replicate this.

Evenly poised? Your anti-Roarness is seeping out here. Pretty sure Roar are in the box seat having never even lost in Gosford. All they have to do is score a goal and the semi is effectively over I think. We all know the Roar's depth and fitness will prove superiorin the end. For this, Ange must be lauded

Melbourne are welcome to have Zola, they seem to be developing a reputation for signing the ‘big name’(Zola not that successful with the Azzurini – Olympic team or West Ham Utd[sacked]) and then just expecting that things will fall their way. Oh the irony for the former Bling of Sydney FC to be 'out-blinged' by MVFC eh? I honestly suspect that for all the upswing in KPIs this year that Fuss mentioned above, if MVC hadn’t signed Harry and played the football they played in pre-season instead of chucking it all in for a hasty ”just get it to Harry policy” they would have played a lot better and registered more wins that they did. At least MVC are still good at getting their name in the newspaper, a not insignificant achievement in Melbourne with the AFL season just beginning.

You remember correctly. I was held up on a train and it actually looked like the game would bedelayed because of the lightning/rain. Can't remember if it was though. Had been at the RE all day

Hate to say it, but Ange to MV would be good for the A-League. If that happens, I would expect Mulvey to come to Brisbane - overall not bad outcome at all!

Kasey, I agree in general about the attendance focus, but when a game between the same teams in the same major semi final loses around 40% of its paying spectators, it would be very unwise not to look at why.

You know, I feel sorry for those on here that can only offer comment on the crowd size as their contribution to the conversation. To me it seems like football is falling into a trap set by the AFL dominated media and its lapdog talking heads rthat set the asgenda in sports mad Australia. That trap is to directly equate crowd size to enjoyment of those in attendance or watching at home. My folks had the AFL game on in the back ground when I visited last and I think I heard the commentators mention the “marsive crowd at the Gee”! about 5 times in 10 minutes rather than you know actually calling the game being played. I equate linking the crowd size at a football game and importance to the way football illiterates link the number of goals in a game to its entertainment value. It’s a trap because obviously the AFL gets incredibly high crowds and is one of the best attended sports leagues in the world so anything else in this country, be it RL, RU or football is going to pale when directly compared. I watched all the games over the weekend and I enjoyed all of them, even the goalless first half of Heart @Glory. That was like watching cage fighters parry and thrust trying to find a weakness before going for the jugular. a very interesting game all-in-all. Sure enough, cometh the moment, cometh the man in Smeltz with a brilliant finals hat-trick. Now if we were to talk about promotion of the league and the game we would all wish for the FFA to do more in terms of its promotion, but again, we are comparing apples to oranges. How much of the AFL’s promotion is league driven/spend and how much is a part of the contra deals negotiated as part of the broadcast agreement that league has with the TV networks? FFA simply doesn’t yet have the money to go head to head and toe to toe with the AFL on advertising itself. Just concentrate on the football and the game will look after itself in the long run.

It was 36 v sydney

Are there any Italians left in Lygon St?

As far as ripostes go ... Ouch!