[VIDEO] Melbourne Victory vs Brisbane Roar highlights: A-League scores, blog

P Marlowe.- Your thoughts are spot on, and though you don't spell it out Roar are now suffering from decisions made months ago. As a championship winning team the recruitment of players to make them a better team has been sadly neglected.Hence we have been left with a team that contains players who, as you say, are not yet ready for the HAL never mind to play in an Asian championship in just a few months time. There is also a hidden agenda in this situation that is even more worrisome and that is to ask why are these players not yet ready for when we examine those on view last night we find the lads Bowles and Petratos have already been "around the traps" at other HAL clubs, Donnachie I feel a bit sorry for,the lad has the physical capablities to perhaps become a good Centre Back but totally lacks those same capabilities to play the attacking fullback role and yet he has been asked to do this in 5 out of 6 matches played so far !!!!. So why the gap in standard?. Why is it when we examine closely the "engine rooms" of the successful HAL clubs we invariably find players who have learned their football far from these shores,and from debate at the moment,these clubs are not about to relinquish this status quo without a fight. That brings us back to football education and how it is conducted for as year after year passes there is little doubt that from the 1974 World Cup team till today,little has changed with Ange Postecoglue still using many more "overseas " players than locally "grown and nurtured" talent. With the existing situation where we have two or three of the HAL clubs apparently in "growth" mode there is a very real chance that within our relatively small top league there is going to be a fiscal difference open up that will see the competition being dominated by these 3 or 4 clubs provided they are run along normal business lines. Cheers and keep up the good work jb

Agree with that - turgid from both teams. Some of the passing from Brisbane's players was the sort of thing you expect at under 13 level. A couple of other thoughts: I almost cannot believe that the Petratos from this year and last year are the same person given the huge difference in form. His form is absolutely woeful (but seems to be an automatic pick when as you point out Lustica was on the bench after a good game last week). The Roar's issues this year presents one of those conundrums as to what do we as fans expect/want from our A League team. In this sense, the Roar have lost good players such as Berisha, Miller and Franjic form last year's team. I think naturally, we as Australian football fans, like to see a local junior get a run to fill in these gaps (as one of the aims of the A League is to help develop local talent). From a local talent perspective then it's great to see guys like Donachie, Borello get a go in the team. On the other hand, from a purely Roar fan's concern about results, I am just not sure if these guys are quite ready (both of them seem to be struggling with the Roar's system a bit).

Fuss -Surprised at your comment,true in every word,but bereft of any suggestions as to why it was so.This game,once a highlight of the season, was reduced to a huge bore,with Roar struggling to keep men behind the ball and nullify Victory's attempts to get the early goal that would have forced a change in the overall game. Now two adages have long been recognised in the game and if one recalls them it starts to raise questions. Firstly, do Roar,fresh from a morale boosting victory against Jets take the field with the same eleven??? No,we have to accomodate a returning Socceroo and the promising left flank that produced 4 goals last weekend was disturbed, Ah yes Lustica must be injured,but no,he comes on as a substitute and causes perhaps Coe's only real save of the game. The other adage? To beat a "stacked" defence a team has to have pace,preferably wide,thus getting the ball behind the defence more often,and, if the service is good,break the nexus.Victory,with perhaps 2 of the fastest wingers in the league ,leave it until the death to bring them on the field with the result Victory looked a better team in the last 20 minutes or so forcing the Roar's all in defensive effort to reach it's peak. Strangely,after the fluky goal, Roar started to show glimpses of what they can do but it was all too little too late. This display is where tactical development has taken us,2 team formations,obviously driven by fear of each other can degenerate what should be a hugely entertaining spectacle into a rather poorly played game of chess with players the pawns and managers the chessmasters.Like it or hate it it is a fact of football life and this game will surely be forgotten very quickly. jb

Bowles played well didn't he? Young had a great game - good saves but his distribution is still a weak point. The performance from Petratos was a mixed bag and Henrique was neutralised. Brisbane would be disappointed not to get a draw (it was far from the drubbing promised by some pundits) but Mulvey will take away some good lessons - Brisbane is a work is progress. That work will be tested next week when Perth fly in with the Irish sniper looking for goals.

Yeah, it was a rubbish match. But flicked it back to the cricket to witness the fireworks over at the MCG. That Faulkner fella is great, he utterly clubbed those Saffers around the park.

Brisbane lacked go forward which has been their problem all season, but I thought they were well organised in the defensive third which contributed to victory never really getting into their usual rhythm. I thought Bowles played well in defence and he looked untroubled by anything that he was faced with. Not sure if the brisbane strategy was to play the way they did with long balls and clearances over the sidelines to disrupt things. They certainly didn't try and play their usual pass at all costs game which I think disrupted victorys play as they never really seemed to be able to settle in to the game....this of course could have been more good fortune than good management on roars part. Berisha getting sbs viewers man of the match??? You have to be kidding. Brisbane are a very different prospect this season, so everyone should get used to not seeing them turn out their polished performances of years past, those days are behind us this season.

Poor quality match from MVFC - occasional cohesive football, the worst 90' this season. Thankfully, Brisbane were shocking. I can't ever recall a Brisbane Roar team that looked bereft of ideas. Thomas Broich, who has tormented MVFC for years, was totally blanketed by young Scotty Galloway. We'll have to bring our A-game next Friday night - AAMI Park should be rocking when AUFC comes to town. Last time we played AUFC at AAMI it was a roller-coaster ride that we ended up winning 4-3.

Well you dont win games if you don't score goals and the roar again struggled to create chances...but so to did victory. A tense game that probably should have seen each team go away with a point.

Coverage on SBS seems a little pro Victory