Besart Berisha helped Melbourne Victory to a scrappy 1-0 victory on Friday night and a temporary return to the top of the A-League ladder.
In a match which lacked fluency, a set-piece always looked likely to settle the contest, and so it proved with 13 minutes remaining.
Fahid Ben Khalfallah’s free kick found the Albanian, whose header deflected off the unfortunate Jade North into the net.
It was a messy own-goal and entirely representative of the contest, in which Brisbane barely threatened.
If the first half is to be remembered, it would be for the tough tackling that produced four yellow cards.
Both Carl Valeri and Mark Milligan were carded for vicious fouls on Matt McKay and Thomas Broich, while McKay returned the favour with a late challenge on Gui Finkler.
Victory’s best early chances came from the boot of Finkler.
Leigh Broxham went close with a free header from a corner, while Roar defender Daniel Bowles nearly headed in from another wicked Finkler cross.
While Victory began to slow towards the end of the half, the last action of the half was a tackle – with Milligan left worse for wear.
As the Socceroo lay strewn on the ground in pain, referee Chris Beath blew his whistle for the break.
The result was the bizarre sight of Victory’s captain surrounded by both physios and the half-time entertainment until he limped down the race for treatment.
Given the agony on Milligan’s face, the Socceroos looked like they would need to find a new midfielder for the Asian Cup.
But Milligan emerged for the second half, as the game continued its scrappy pattern.
Fahid Ben Khalfallah went close on 66 minutes when his deflected long-range drive sailed wide with Jamie Young stranded.
It seemed the match would end goalless when Broxham again headed off-target from another set play but finally Victory made one count on 77 minutes.
Young then pulled off a fine save to stop Broxham from close range – and denied a breakaway chance from Khalfallah in injury time.
Muscat said the game wasn’t much of a spectacle.
“It was a shame a goal didn’t come earlier in the game,” he said.
“It’s great to be sitting here with three points… (but) I didn’t think the performance was particularly great.”
Mulvey said there was no discredit losing 1-0 to Victory.
“When you get into the 77th minute, it was going to be something scrappy to win the game,” he said.
The win took Victory back to the league’s summit, awaiting the result of Friday night’s late match in Perth.
j binnie
Guest
RBB -There is an old saying in the language "Where there is smoke their must be fire" and I'm afraid that saying's implication is more prevalent in sport than it is in everyday life. Mike Mulvey has had a charmed coaching life and probably the biggest potential stone around his neck was always going to be in the success he enjoyed in his time at Roar.He did have success with a reasonably experienced team ,there is no doubt ,but it is in the aftermath to that success that the smouldering "sparks" started to spread their influence. Coaching or managing a professional football team is not an easy task and as the close season progressed and the news filtered through of Berisha's and Franjic's pending departures alarm bells should have started to ring in Mike's head for if there is a weakness in his CV it could be a lack of real long term experience at this level of football.It was reported he had gone to England on a recruitment drive but nothing appeared to confirm that was true,though a couple of "local boy" signings or contract extensions did take place. Now that poses the question ,was the trip to England really to chase recruitment of players or was there some restriction on how much was allocated to the acquirement of 'better' players?????. Now you may retort that "new" players were not needed but I think results so far this season have proved that not to be correct,in fact there is not a team anywhere in world football that cannot be improved and that is a very necessary part of a successful manager's task,especially when ,in Mike's case, he was going to be facing a "new" competition this year at a higher level, the Asian championships. I don't suppose we will ever get the real story from behind the scenes,we seldom do ,but one thing that has emerged is that the man nominated to be his "temporary" replacement has not coached at a top team level for some years now,in fact has been employed more as a youth team coach for the last 12 years with various Middle Eastren clubs. For older readers he should not be confused with that other Dutch master Arnold Muhren who played with Thijssen in a very successful partnership with Ipswich Town in England when they were in the top league in the first division.Muhren went on to continue his career with the mighty Ajax of Van Basten and co. Franz went on to have short spells with Notts Forest and Vancouver before finishing his career with lower teams in Holland. Now the question is, what are this man's chances of turning things around in the short time left or is it another poisoned chalice in the making? Time will tell,That's modern football. jb
RBBAnonymous
Guest
I cant believe the Roar sacked Mulvey. What a bunch of idiots. Who in their right mind would want to work for the Bakries now. Unbelievable decision.
Bondy
Guest
rusty0256 Very true , football remains hidden within the mainstream media and websites . What's it going to be like in 5-10 yrs time ?. . They're not going to up or pump the HAL under any circumstance . The HAL will remain one of the highest attended sports but dismissed by the white media in this country .
rusty0256
Guest
The ODI crowd (or rather lack of a crowd), was despite almost overwhelming preview media coverage in Melbourne. ODI was the lead preview sport story on FTA, radio and likewise on the Hun / Age websites. Compare this to preview coverage of the Victory/Roar match, it was largely invisible across commercial FTA, relegated well into the back pages of print media and likewise nowhere to be found on the main web pages of the Sun / Age (unless you went specifically to the Football / Soccer tags). So Victory getting close to double the numbers to across the road at the MCG is a nice thing but TV rating of course are a whole other matter and we can be sure Cricket will win handsomely in that area.
Fussball ist unser leben
Roar Guru
Bondy I think the u22 team is critical - it's the gatekeeper for the final stage in the elite football pyramid: the senior men's Australian National Football Team. I think it's not just coincidence that the last u23 team did not qualify for the London Olympics & the current National Team is struggling. From what I read, the u22 four nation tournament was a decent hit out for the lads (albeit devastating for Gameiro) Australia's results > Sth Korea: won > Brasil: draw > China: loss
AZ_RBB
Guest
A little confused......
Bondy
Guest
AZ_RBB We rarely watch commercial TV in our household and we're Anglo's ....
Bondy
Guest
Fuss and others Just on the U/22's should A League based players be playing in that or those tournaments ? Shouldnt we be moving younger players into the U/22's instead of A League based players, this discussion is not about club or country but the likes of Pain and Gramiro "out for the season knee" have proved themselves in the HAL shouldn't younger inexperienced kids be taking their place in these squads . _______________ Overall I agree with Mid I didn't mind the game last night a bit to physical though masking the skill attributes . An unfortunate goal from North but a deserved win by V . Also nice to see Berisha's professionalism towards his former Club ...
Matthew Skellett
Guest
Just an aside , the FFA and the HAL are only about 1,300 memberships shy of the 110, 000 target for this season
j binnie
Guest
Fuss - Don't disagree with any of your observations,Having watched some of the greatest playing Herrera's version of Catenaccio I am well versed in the tactic right down the the "spoiling and minute time wasting" that was involved as a psychological "extra" on how to play football. My concern is that that tactic is now some 55 years old and was discarded as a ploy some 45 years ago and has only raised it's ugly head since being used at the highest level in the last few seasons,Chelsea, with all it's expensive talent, being one of the offenders. My reference to the use of Costa and Pain goes back to an experience I had when Aberdeen ,under Sir Alex Ferguson, elected to keep an international winger sitting on the bench (due to past injury) when playing in the home leg of a European Cup Winners Cup against Porto. With 10 minutes to go ,and down 1-0,SAF brought on his "injured" winger and for 10 minutes this lad tore the Porto defence apart but it was too little too late.The debate afterwards was should the lad have opened the game (score at 0-0) and did his outstanding work before perhaps having to be taken off. Think about that. Another thing you may not have noticed was that Roar's published line up put Broich at outside left when in fact he had played the deep centre forward role the week before. That,and the dropping of Lustica I was finding hard to comprehend (the whole left flank had created and scored the 4 goals against the Jets) and after about 5-10 minutes both Mike Mulvey and Ron Smith gave curious little "circular motions" towards the field and Broich and Henrique switched positions.What this schoolboy 'trick" was supposed to achieve just made me wonder all the more.Such is football. jb e
AZ_RBB
Guest
Not just a bigger crowd, but nearly double the crowd. So much so that the CA has launched an investigation into what went wrong. The only promotion I've seen for the ODI series is a strange 4 tickets for the price of 3 deal which is utterly ridiculous for how niche it is. Atmosphere at MVFC v Brisbane was great despite the highlights being few and far between. MVFC v Adelade next Friday looks like it might be a cracker. Ground should be close to capacity for this and with a proper football pitch we might get the spectacle we missed out on earlier in the season.
j binnie
Guest
Mid - You know the old saying "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" so,so be it. Regarding crowds, as promised to "punter" and others, last night's games took us past the 500,000 mark in 31 games compared with last year's 33 matches to reach or bypass that target. This means that as of last night we are enjoying a "growth' of just under 5.5% in HAL crowd figures this season.The average crowd at the 31 games played is standing at 16,301 compared to last season's 15,464 for the same number of games. Some not so good figures are the fact that despite Victory,greatly exceeding their last years total average gate by some 7,500,Sydney by some 9,500, Adelaide by 6,000,Melb City by 3,000, all good growth, disappontingly CCM and Wellington are showing "minus " figures of around 1,000 per game. Hope this is of some interest.jb
Striker
Guest
yeah mid true but the TV ratings are big compared to ours.
Fussball ist unser leben
Roar Guru
jb Thanks for the comments (I also read the other reply on the match day thread). I'll try to address the issues you raised - these are my observations from sitting - right on the half-way line, on level 3 with a perfect view to watch the structure & movement of both teams. 1. Brisbane's defence structure reminded me of Popovic's WSW (last season, not this season where it leaks goals). The back 4 were well structured & disciplined. The back 4 showed no interest in pushing high up the park. The back 4 had no interest in passing the ball out the way BRI used to when they entertained the ALeague - just lumped long balls forward. 2. It was obvious Brisbane came to Docklands with the idea of stifling MVFC's free-flowing game - they created stoppages every couple of minutes. When BRI were in control of a stoppage they would waste time - particularly with goal kicks. 3. From the outset, it was obvious BRI didn't have any interest in scoring - they were happy to not concede & rely on long balls hoping MVFC's back 4 would make an error & Henrique would capitalise. I don't ever recall any BRI side - even pre-Ange playing such negative football 4. MVFC tried to play. But, whenever Finkler got the ball he got chopped. Berisha was constantly being blocked when he tried to make runs. You won't see any of this on the TV, because it's happening off the ball. But, having said that, refer to Point 1 - i.e. BRI defended very well 5. MVFC did have very good chances - off the top of my head: Georgievski passes to Berisha inside the box; Broxham header just wide from corner, FBK one-on-one with GK, set piece Milligan heads across the box & Young puts in excellent save. 6. Pain & Kosta were brought on late because they only arrived in Melbourne 24 hours before the match. Kosta was in Thailand with the NZL national team; Pain was in China with the u22 AUS national team. Overall, I'm delighted with the result. MV have shown they're now capable of winning ugly. This is something we've not done in the past. Too often, in the previous seasons under such conditions, MV would've lost, or drawn. We showing a resilience in fighting back into games (AUFC, MCFC, NEW) and grinding results (BRI) that we haven't shown before. But, we'll need to bring out A-game next Friday against AUFC. Thankfully, AUFC won't bring the negative tactics that Brisbane brought.
Midfielder
Guest
Interesting MV had a bigger crowd than the ODI...
Midfielder
Guest
Maybe I am the odd one out but I enjoyed the match and saw two teams marking very tightly with lots of pressure on whoever had the ball with the play-makers in each side being both tightly marked in addition to having lines to them covered...
j binnie
Guest
Ben- You have reported the comments of both coaches and from them can be taken two conclusions. Why did Victory,with 2 of the fastest wingers in our game wait so long to get them involved for, as Kevin says, this game did need an early goal and from the outset the Roar's intentions were obvious to all present.Now it could be argued that both these lads had had busy travel schedules recently but then the question has to be put, if Kevin wants a quick goal, should he have used them from the start and replaced them if and when they showed signs of tiring. Mike on the other hand says "there is no discredit in losing to Victory". That statement in itself is almost impossible to believe inasmuch it hints that the result may have been expected.and the way the team played certainly did nothing to discourage that thinking in the minds of observers.With the result this team that performed so well last week was reduced to a stuttering "machine", almost totally devoid of any cohesion between it's parts, that seldom threatened the Victory goalkeeper for 90 minutes so I'm afraid Roar's problems go much deeper than "respect for an opponent". jb
Ian
Guest
May be bias but thought a draw was looking like the result and a fair one at that. Fairly nervous and tense for the whole match. The predicted annihilation and hat-trick from Berisha didn't happen. From reports of Roar fans at the game he came over and spoke with them for a while. Decent defensive effort which is a lot improved from the effort shown in a couple of games this year.