This weekend’s elimination finals were a reminder of the quality of the product on offer for the APL to advertise, should they ever choose to focus on football instead of relentless gimmickry.
Sydney FC’s storming 2-1 win over the Western Sydney Wanderers at CommBank Stadium on Saturday night was one of the comebacks of the season.
The Sky Blues were second best throughout the first half and arguably deserved to go into the interval a goal down – even if the Wanderers were slightly fortunate to earn a penalty for Alex Wilkinson’s contentious handball.
Yet it was Steve Corica’s men who stormed out of the blocks in a ferocious second half and not for the first time, it was Robert Mak who made all the difference.
The Slovakian international was unstoppable after the break, calmly slotting home the equaliser after a poor defensive header by Adama Traore, before landing a pinpoint corner on the edge of the six-yard box for Adam Le Fondre to steer home the winner with a glancing header.
It was a fearsome display of attacking firepower from a team that has done it all before, and it sets up a genuinely intriguing two-legged semi-final with premiers Melbourne City.
(Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images)
Spare a thought for Wanderers fans, though. Six seasons after their last finals appearance, Marko Rudan’s men crashed out at the first hurdle after a bewilderingly timid second-half display.
They weren’t helped by their captain Marcelo, who was out-jumped by one of the smallest players on the pitch in Le Fondre for Sydney FC’s winner, before somehow heading substitute Yeni Ngbakoto’s free-kick over the crossbar with five minutes remaining when it looked easier to score.
Does an elimination final defeat garner a pass mark for a side completely rebuilt by Rudan? Or does the manner of Saturday night’s defeat take the shine off an otherwise successful season?
It will be interesting to see where Ufuk Talay ends up, after Adelaide United ended his four-season stint as Wellington Phoenix coach with a 2-0 win at Coopers Stadium on Friday night.
The visitors started brightly and almost took an early lead when their star Polish striker Oscar Zawada stung the palms of Joe Gauci following a defensive lapse from Ben Warland.
But if Gauci has fast developed into the safest pair of hands in the league, then Craig Goodwin is the competition’s biggest star.
Adelaide always looked the likelier winners when Goodwin took full advantage of Callan Elliot’s failure to deal with a swerving Louis D’Arrigo cross, with Socceroos winger Goodwin twisting and turning his Kiwi counterpart before burying a shot into the far corner of Oli Sail’s goal with his weaker foot.
If the Phoenix thought Goodwin was tough to deal with, they must have dreaded the sight of Nestory Irankunda coming off the bench.
It took the teenager less than four minutes to end the game as a contest, as he combined with Goodwin for a length-of-the-pitch counter-attack that was only ended by Elliot’s stumbling foul.
Was Goodwin ever going to miss from the spot? His impudent penalty straight down the middle should be plastered all over the APL’s marketing next season.
But they’re too busy spouting self-serving nonsense to get on with the job they’re supposedly paid to do.
Danny Townsend (Photo by Mark Evans/Getty Images)
The latest bombshell that Bundesliga giants Bayern München had rejected the APL’s advances to play a friendly against the A-League All-Stars leaves their Grand Final plans in ruins.
Fresh from trashing 17 seasons of actual tradition and rushing through a neutral Grand Final venue nobody wanted, the APL has now failed to lock in the ‘festival of football’ that was supposed to justify the whole ridiculous endeavour in the first place.
There’s no sign of these fan-friendly travel packages they talked about either.
If the upcoming semi-finals match the sheer quality of the elimination finals, we’d have all the ingredients needed to effectively market the A-League to casual football fans.
If only our clumsy, Clouseau-esque administrators could see that.
chris1
Roar Rookie
Good crowds for both the finals matches and Ch 10 doing an ok job.
Mike Tuckerman
Expert
Well the FIFA World Cup is obviously a FIFA event. There's only so much Football Australian can do, when it comes to marketing, because ultimately they don't control anything.
AR
Roar Rookie
Fair enough. I assumed your comment that I needed to "move into the real world" meant that you supported the Bayern Munich spend. As for the 'curtain-raiser' point, I thought the whole idea was to create a football-carnival build up in Sydney that culminated in the ALeague final - seems we both agree that these games can, in fact, have the opposite effect.
Punter
Roar Rookie
Now the decision to make whether this is a good idea or not, I don't know, I don't see the books. I too don't attend any of these friendlies, but there seems an appetite for it. Last year Barcelona came out & played an A-League Allstars game in which a certain Garang Kuol starred & went on to become one of the youngest players to play in a world cup & signed for PL club Newcastle after that. This match against Bayern was deemed to been played a week before the GF, there would never be a curtain raiser before a big game, as you would tear up the ground. This match would also be played against an AllStars A-League team as it was deemed a success last year. Unfortunately due to more idiotic decisions from the APL & idiotic actions from some Melb Victory fans, any momentum from Socceroos success in the WC & last year's All stars match have been lost & even diehard A-League fans are struggling this year. You are right on 1 count though, only the A-League can increase interest in themselves. The quality of some of the matches have been excellent, especially with the likes of Melb City, Adelaide, Central Coast Mariners & West Sydney playing some champagne football, even Sydney pulled something out of the hat & were amazing on Sat night. However, we have some very wrong people at the helm who have little idea on how to market the league in this country. We even have players that no other code in Australia has, we had 2 players scoring goals in the World Cup, against teams like France, Denmark & Argentina no less. So yes I too lay the full blame on the APL.
AR
Roar Rookie
The question of when/what a government uses tax-payer money for is always a legitimate discussion to have. The ICC 'tournament' event in 2015 (that you're referring to) was part of a series of exhibition tournaments played in the US, China and Australia. For the Australian leg, Real Madrid, Man City and AS Roma played over several days at the MCG before crowds of 100k people. The 'sell' by the government was that it would generate $150M into the economy. Those figures are always rubbery. I went to the Real v Man City game. I'd previously been to plenty of NSL, ALeague and Socceroos games, and I would never go to one of these big marquee exhibition friendlies again. The lack of intensity of the pitch is palpable from the stands. And I believe they ultimately damage the ALeague. A one-off game involving Bayern Munich is a different story again. To have this event, as a curtain-raiser to the ALM Final is, in my opinion, a terrible idea - both in terms of tax-payer spending and in terms of how it cheapens the ALeague product. It will NOT result in increased interest in the ALeague. Only the ALeague can do that. If you think it's a good spend, that's your prerogative.
Football is Life
Roar Rookie
love your work Punter.......Kochie's a dope
Punter
Roar Rookie
Slowly by slowly the government are starting to understand the reaches of football, ie Sam Kerr. Also a rematch of Socceroos v Argentina in China to help mend relationships between China & Australia. No Kochie's foray into China in sight.
Punter
Roar Rookie
Corica finish us 5th end of topic, no GF win will convince otherwise. Celtic, as you probably know just won the Scottish PL, they cannot be caught with 3-4 games left. They are currently 48 pts ahead of 5th place Hibernian & if they had finals like Australia, it would take a lot of alcohol to convince me that Hibernian was the best team in the league if they won the GF.
Punter
Roar Rookie
They did on Ronaldo & got him down to Melbourne & play on the MCG, even got you to a football game. Certainly not a royalist, but I can see while taxpayer monies goes towards such things as the Coronation, they do generate global media interest & lots of money coming into the economy. Likewise, when Ronaldo graced the MCG, it generated lots of media interest around the world & money into the economy. So why not entice millionaire sportsmen from Germany, especially a high profile one like Bayern Munich with their array of stars. You don't even have to stop at sportsmen, the govt bids for entertainment events like Rock/Pop/Rap singers/groups, movie stars, musicals & other such events. Need to move into the real world AR.
AR
Roar Rookie
ALeague fans didn't know the finals were on?
AR
Roar Rookie
You think the government should be spending millions of taxpayer dollars to millionaire sportsmen from Germany for a one-off exhibition match?
Brainstrust
Roar Rookie
Channel 10 zero promos.
Brainstrust
Roar Rookie
Well Perth Glory they got 5k to the grand final in Brisbane. It show how poor Adelaide is to Perth. The question is why are the refs favouring Adelaide , Glory have got the rough edge of the wedge with the refs.
Brainstrust
Roar Rookie
This is the most important issue at the current point in time, the finals are on now. If Channel 7 are doing this much now, how much will they do when it comes closer. So the only one performing at the moment is Channel 7 who are constantly derided. What about ads on the other channels and other places thats the FFA's responsibility for the world cup. If magic round can have ads on other channels why cant the FFA do something for the world cup. Their main interest seems to be the second division the holy grail of utter stupidity to me this neglect is a sacking offence. The FFA head and entire board need to be cleared out. If looking at the performance of Danny Townsend , in the good column is only the selling of the grand final its money for nothing, despite the deluded and hypocritical mob who oppose it. The other column which matters and which Lowy was the master of its endless fails, bad marquee , money wasted . letting Channel 10 get away with murder in terms of lack of promos.
Para+Ten ISUZU Subway support Australian Football
Roar Rookie
I believe so because the first leg is a mirror representation of the second leg. If the away team scores a goal in the first leg they go into the second leg with a goal advantage. The away goal rule lessens the possibility of a penalty shoot-out in the final leg with a home-town advantage.
Grem
Roar Rookie
That’s good to hear about Channel 7 and I agree that Channel 10 needs to promote their game more.
Brainstrust
Roar Rookie
Channel 7 are running decent promos on the world cup and the Matildas now, the tickets for the Matildas I thought were sold out ages ago. What about Channel 10 , what is the story with this channel , I have seen no promos for the finals, the womens grand final there was sort of an ad for tickets, but it under 10 sec long and like a speed reader you can barely understand it. In fact its a common theme some of the A-league promos were a few seconds , but even the longest were short anyway. They made that promo and hardly showed it.
Christian Montegan
Roar Pro
Don't worry Grem, when the World Cup officially gets underway, they'll all have a good idea of what's going on and the enormity of the event! They really are bad. The Matildas are an incredibly marketable team. Let's just hope that those people marketing both them and the WC don't let the opportunity go to waste
Christian Montegan
Roar Pro
At the same time though, if an away team has an extra 30 minutes in the second leg to score an away goal, is that fair? That would be my only criticism of the rule.
NoMates
Roar Rookie
Everyone know the AFL was on and everyone knew the NRL was on, So why didn't anyone know the ALM finals where on?