Victory in Melbourne 

With Kevin Muscat venting his frustration at the end of Wednesday night’s match against Beijing Guoan, taking aim at everything to do with the ACL it surely wasn’t long before we would get a comment from Ben Buckley. And again he showed why he starting to look out of his depth as the man in charge of Australian football.

Buckley went on to slam Melbourne’s attitude towards the ACL, suggesting if the Victory didn’t want to compete they would be better off forfeiting their place to another A-League side.

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If Kevin’s comments reflect the attitude of the leadership of Melbourne Victory, then they should withdraw from the competition and let others who want to participate take part,” Buckley said. ”Such an attitude is clearly an impediment to success and Melbourne Victory’s performance in the tournament is reflective of that.

Of course we want to participate in the ACL tournament, why the hell do you think we tried our darndest to qualify for next year’s competition much to the detriment of this year’s ACL campaign. And as I have said before a little support from the FFA would not have gone astray instead of these cheap shots at a team who have had just had a tough run of results in the last month and a half. The comments from Buckley were ill-conceived and untimely and he should take some of his own advice and haul himself over some coals.

With much being made of the crowd numbers during Melbourne Victory’s disastrous 2010 ACL campaign surely some responsibility lays at the feet of both the FFA and the Melbourne Victory administration.

Knowing full well that there would be ACL campaign at the end of this season surely it wouldn’t haven’t been too hard for the Melbourne Victory administration to include the three group games as part of your membership package. Even having it has add-on to the membership should have been an option. Contrary to what Kevin Muscat had to say, Melbourne fans weren’t disuaded from attending due to the antics of opposition teams it probably had more to do with the tickets. With General Admin tickets starting at $27, when compared to $20 for a regular season game you can see why a number of fans stayed away especially after forking out significant amounts of money for finals tickets.

However, the FFA must foot some of the blame as well as they continued the trend of the regular A-League season by putting little or no effort into promoting the game to the general public. If the general public doesn’t know about it, how do you expect them to turn up to games.

With this in mind, when it all comes around next year let’s hope it’s handled better by all parties involved because as Melbourne Victory fans we do like to watch our team play.

While it was disappointing to go down to Gamba Osaka in the dying minutes of what had been a pulsating match, the reality is that on the night the better team probably won. Although Gamba Osaka is making a habit of scoring in the penultimate minutes of matches having done so in all of their ACL games so far this campaign. But what grabbed my attention, and it may be stating the obvious, was that ACL football is so much better than A-League football. It was my first ACL game in the flesh as I had missed the opening game against Chunnam Dragons due to work commitments. The style of play is better, the technical ability of teams comes to the fore, and of course the support is better.

Starting with the style of play. It was of much slower pace and thus more controlled than A-League, where teams try run the opposition of the park. The technical ability of our opposition was far superior and it showed. Gamba’s ability to put in decent crosses time after time eventually took its toll in the end, with three of their four goals coming from the head. Mike Tuckerman, in my previous post stated that one of Gamba’s most obvious strengths is their set pieces. Yasuhito Endo is probably one of the best set piece takers in Asia, and he’s a constant menace over any kind of dead ball. How true were those words. Its also worth noting that they have seven current full internationals, and their last substitute Under 20 national team representative.

Our propensity to rely on the long ball was grating at times. We really missed the influence of Hernandez in the midfield, who I believe would have flourished in this style of play. When we have players such as Pace and Pantelidis in our midfield it does not bode well. Having to push players such as Ward and to a lesser extent, Caceres forward, really limits the creativity of our midfield. Standout players for the night were Celeski, Caceres, Allsopp and Muscat.

And finally to the support. The support was awesome. Everyone was talking about it after the Chunnam game but of course I didn’t experience it. This time I was sitting directly opposite the North Terrace and directly above the South Terrace. The sound generated by those opposite me was fantastic and with all the oversized flags it was truly an inspiring site. Lets hope it continues in the upcoming season. Kudos also to the visiting supporters from Osaka as well, who although small in number and maybe stature, generated plenty of their own noise as well.

So obviously our chances of moving past the group stage range from pretty slim to nil after last night’s result but there is much to be learnt from our first journey into Asia, not only for Melbourne Victory but for Australian clubs in general. The teams we have encountered from the J-League so far can serve as prime example of the direction in which we should be heading, especially in developing local talent.

With the upcoming crucial games against Gamba Osaka for Melbourne Victory in the Asian Champions League I decided to find out more about our opposition. So thanks to Mike Tuckerman, an Australian who lives in Japan and a mad Shimizu S-Pulse fan, who has provided some insight into Gamba Osaka. His blog is also worth checking out if you are a fan of the J-League as well.

1. How would you describe Gamba Osaka’s style of play? What are their strengths and weaknesses?

For the past few years Gamba have been renowned as one of the most attacking sides in Japanese football. Certainly Akira Nishino is a coach who prefers free-flowing, attractive football and he has fielded a 4-3-3 formation for Gamba’s last couple of league games. The problem for the Osakans is confidence. That attacking style hasn’t yielded the expected results, particularly over the past two seasons. Now they seem to be at the crossroads of how they want to play, and I think they’ll be very wary of the pace of Melbourne Victory .

One of Gamba’s most obvious strengths is their set pieces. Yasuhito Endo is probably one of the best set piece takers in Asia, and he’s a constant menace over any kind of dead ball. He’s also an incisive passer of the ball, and while he is prone to go missing in games, I think the way he plays will have an important bearing on the outcome of the two matches.

As for weaknesses, Gamba have plenty at the moment. In particular their defence looks weak, and the question of where to play teenager Michihiro Yasuda is a thorny one. He’s often exposed in a back four, but doesn’t quite seem to have the nous to operate effectively in midfield. Confidence is always a key factor for Japanese clubs at the moment, and while Gamba have won their past three league matches in a row, they’ve all been scrappy wins against sides struggling with their own problems at the moment.

2. Who are the key players that Melbourne Victory should be wary of?

The key players are Yasuhito Endo and Bare.

Everything goes through Endo, and closing him down in midfield will prove key to Melbourne’s chances of winning.

As for Bare, he’s a predatory goal-poacher. He’s not an especially skillful player, but he has the brilliant knack of always seeming to be in the right place at the right time to score crucial goals.

I’d have also suggested that former Japan international Ryuji Bando has a point to prove - both to Gamba coach Nishino and to Japan coach Takashi Okada, but Bando is injured and looks like he’ll play no part in Melbourne.

3. Will there be a significant travelling contigent from Osaka?

Since there is rarely a significant travelling contingent from Osaka for J. League games, I doubt it. Osaka is a baseball town, and unlike the Kanto plain (the region surrounding Tokyo where most of the J. League teams are based) and Shizuoka (the hotbed of Japanese football), the citizens of Kansai (where Osaka is the main city) haven’t quite taken to football as they have elsewhere in the country. Gamba’s compact Expo ‘70 Stadium is generally packed for J. League fixtures, but that’s just because they’ve been relatively successful over the past few seasons. I suspect that if cross-town rivals Cerezo Osaka had been just as successful, then most football fans in Osaka would identify themselves as Cerezo fans.

4. How are Gamba Osaka faring in the J-League in the early stages of the season?

They’ve flattered to deceive. As I said, they’ve just won three fixtures in a row, but they were arguably out-played by Shimizu S-Pulse last weekend. The early rounds of the J. League are generally fairly deceptive, and it’s not until the season breaks for the summer that one has a general idea of who might challenge for title honours (although at the break last season Kashima Antlers were in fourth, some eleven points behind league leaders Gamba). I think Gamba will be particularly concerned by this trip to Melbourne, especially as it’s being talked up in the Japanese press a little bit.

5. There are reports that Gamba Osaka must play three J-League games in six days before flying to Melbourne. Do you think this will have any significant impact?

It’s true that Gamba have just played three fixtures in six days. The AFC Champions League is unlikely to come into consideration when the J. League draws up the fixture list, particularly with the twin concerns of World Cup qualification and the Beijing Olympics taking precedence. The bad news for Melbourne fans is that Gamba won all three of those matches! However I certainly think it will have a significant impact, particularly as the toughest of those games was the last one against Shimizu S-Pulse. With the exception of the injured Ryuji Bando, they fielded a full strength starting eleven in that game, and I think several of the Gamba players will be fatigued by the time they hit the tarmac in Melbourne.

6. What do you think the result will be?

I have no idea! Both sides are nervous about each other’s capabilities, and I think it will be a cagey affair in Melbourne. I think an individual error will settle it.