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Opinion
When Nick D’Agostino smashed home one of the goals of the season in Melbourne Victory’s entertaining 1-1 draw with Adelaide United on Saturday night, he did so in front of an empty away stand.
D’Agostino’s unstoppable 20-yard rocket flashed into the top corner of Joe Gauci’s goal, in front of what is normally a packed away end that was instead covered by a black tarpaulin.
Victory fans had been advised not to travel to Adelaide for the Original Rivalry clash, with all tickets bought from a Melbourne postcode deemed invalid.
We can thank Original Style Melbourne for that.
It was from Victory’s self-appointed home end that dozens of spectators sprinted onto the pitch at last month’s abandoned Melbourne derby, and judging by some of the group’s subsequent statements, they don’t seem overly perturbed.
“OSM will not be disbanding,” began a statement posted by the group to social media last Friday. “Our group was formed independently and only we control our future.”
That may be true, but OSM have a bigger problem than just posting and deleting social media announcements, like they did with their apology to referee Alex King and Melbourne City goalkeeper Tom Glover after the derby.
(Photo by Darrian Traynor/Getty Images)
Because too many young men still use A-League games as an excuse to commit acts of anti-social behaviour – and a disproportionate number of them are Melbourne Victory fans.
I’ve been criticised in the past for suggesting these young men are not football fans.
But they’re not football fans – at least in the traditional sense of buying a ticket to watch the action on the pitch.
What they are fans of is causing trouble.
Fuelled by insatiable anti-authoritarianism, the more you ask these miscreants to follow rules, the more desperate they are to break them.
That’s what makes what happened at the Melbourne derby so frustrating.
The 29 fans arrested – some of whom were already serving bans – couldn’t care less about results on the pitch.
What these attention-seeking hooligans crave is a platform to live out their anti-social fantasies on a public stage.
And in their self-entitled minds, the APL’s decision to stage the next three Grand Finals in Sydney gave them licence to do exactly that.
Sadly, it’s everyone else who pays the price, with away fans banned en masse despite the overwhelming majority of supporters having never put a foot wrong.
Which is a real shame, because as entertaining as some of the football has been in recent weeks, there’s been a noticeable lack of atmosphere inside the grounds.
Victory’s draw with Adelaide was an enjoyable Saturday night free-to-air showcase, however Perth Glory went one better and came from two goals down to force a 2-2 draw with Sydney FC deep into stoppage time.
The lights going out at Macedonia Park felt like an appropriate metaphor, and under-fire Sydney FC coach Steve Corica will be desperately disappointed to have seen his team concede the equaliser in what ended up being the 102nd minute of the game.
If the Sky Blues were left frustrated, Western Sydney Wanderers were probably laughing after they held Melbourne City to a 1-1 draw in blazing sunshine in Parramatta on Sunday afternoon despite the reigning premiers firing off more than 30 shots at goal.
Despite throwing everything at their hosts, Rado Vidosic’s team just couldn’t find a winner, as Jamie Maclaren’s 10-game goal-scoring streak finally came to an end.
The results left Melbourne City four points clear of second-placed Central Coast Mariners with a game a hand, and even at this early stage of the season, it’s clear City are the team to beat.
“I say it all the time – but how good is the away team support?” tweeted Wellington Phoenix’s general manager David Dome about his team’s win in Redcliffe, oblivious to the fact that Brisbane Roar’s away fans were effectively banned from attending a fixture last week.
It’s symptomatic of a competition that has always treated away fans as an afterthought.
Unfortunately for those who do like to travel to support their team, the actions of a selfish few have spoiled the away day experience for the rest of us.