Victory in Melbourne 

Welcome to Victory In Melbourne’s minute by minute analysis of Melbourne Victory’s first clash of their 2010 Asian Champions League campaign against Beijing Guoan at the Beijing Workers Stadium, Beijing. All the action kickoffs at 10:30pm AEST and we will be keeping you up-to-date as to when Joel Griffiths cops his first kick or whether the orange ball will be needed because it’s snowing and everything in between. Whilst you are waiting for it all to happen you might as well check out what we know about Beijing Guoan here.

(Note: This page does not automatically update so you are going have to keep hitting that refresh button to see what’s going on.)

0 mins: And we have kick-off. Melbourne starting with an unchanged line-up from Thursday wins against Sydney. As for Beijing, only one Griffiths gets a start with Ryan on the bench.

Melbourne starting XI: Langerak (gk), Muscat (c), Sukha, Broxham, Brebner, Vargas, Pondeljak, Hernandez, Ward, Leijer and Mrdja.

Beijing starting XI: Hao Wu, Ting Zhou, Darko Matic, Liang Xu, Valdo, Xiangchuang Yan, Xy Yunlong (c), Yang Zhi (gk), Yifan Zhu, Joel Griffiths and Maurice Ross

4 mins: Have to say I don’t mind the Victory away strip. Can’t say the same thing for the Beijing strip as those numbers are really hard to read.

9 mins: Pretty cagey start so far. Neither team really having any clear cut chances. Only stat that is getting a workout at the moment is the foul count with neither keeper having work to do apart form the odd goal kick. Valdo and Hernandez getting a bit of heavy treatment from their respective opponents.

12 mins: First foul on Joel Griffiths goes to Sukha. Griffiths at his whinging best asks for a yellow card but the referee is not forthcoming.

Play has stopped for the moment as the referee has appeared copped a laser in the eye from the home supporters and his having a bit of trouble with his eyesight.

18 mins: Some nervous moments in the penalty area as Vargas has some issues with Valdo after Muscat failed to clear a cross. Muscat recovers to restrict any further danger.

24 mins: Melbourne finally get their first corner of the match. Picks out an unmarked Muscat who sidefoots wide of the mark and that brings up Melbourne’s first attempt on goal. Melbourne playing too many long balls at the moment for my liking. We need to get Hernandez, Pondeljak, Ward and Co. into the play more.

27 mins: Pondeljak forces a great save out Yang Zhi from about 30 yards. The resulting corner comes to nothing. Melbourne’s first shot on target. They way Pondeljak shots reminds me of the way I shoot in futsal, all about placement and not so much about power. His last shot being the exception.

30 mins: Hernandez shakes off three defenders to get a shot off. Unfortunately, for the Victory his shot went wide.

Hernandez show his disgust at his effort on goal.

32 mins: Yellow card for Sukha for tug of Xiangchuang Yan’s shirt.

35 mins: Beijing effort cleared off the line by Sukha. At first glance it looked it was behind the line but replays confirmed that the clearance was okay. Victory also managed to block Ross’ follow up shot.

38 mins: Yifan Zhu puts a shot just wide of the mark with Langerak beaten. Just as I was saying Melbourne was getting back into the game Beijing have created a number of good chances. For Melbourne, Sukha is walking a fine line at the moment. Needs to relax a little by my reckoning as he is throwing himself into tackles, Leigh Broxham style.

41 mins: Langerak pulls off a brilliant save to deny Valdo after being set up by Joel Griffiths.

42 mins: Nik Mrdja fails to get a shot off as he is through on goal from a brilliant little chip from Nick Ward. Maurice Ross shepherds him off the ball nicely. I bet Ernie Merrick is hoping that half time can’t come quickly enough as Beijing are starting to dominate at the moment. That pesky Joel Griffiths being particularly dangerous.

45 mins + 3: And there goes Albadwawi Madhad Saif’s whistle for half time. After a slow start from both team, Beijing has looked pretty dangerous in the last fifteen minutes or so of the half with the combination of Griffiths and Valdo. being particular dangerous. Melbourne needs to impose its midfield more on the game as at the moment they aren’t seeing much of the ball at the moment.

46 mins: Surat Sukha makes way for Evan Berger at the start of the second half.

49 mins: Brenton Speed makes a very bad pun using one of the Beijing player’s name.

50 mins: Valdo gets the better of Rodrigo Vargas with his shot hitting the side netting after appearing to come off the leg of Muscat. Home fans get a little excited thinking they had opened the scoring. Melbourne get the goal kick though.

52 mins: Joe Griffiths opens the scoring for Beijing as he beats Langerak from close range. Griffiths continues his love affair of scoring against Melbourne. 1-0 to Beijing. Looks like he got a little help from a Vargas deflection.

54 mins: Langerak makes another great save to deny a long range Beijing free kick. The home side well on top at the moment.

58 mins: Looks like Matthew Foschini is going to get a run. Wonder who he is going to replace. Wouldn’t mind seeing Angulo getting a run.

60 mins: Foschini replaces Berger. Must have picked up some injury in an earlier challenge. Can’t see any other reason for his subsitution.

64 mins: Pondeljak blazes well over the bar from inside the penalty area after some excellent build up play from the Victory. They need to be careful to be caught on the break as they look for the equaliser.

65 mins: Muscat’s power of influence extends to Asian referees as gets Valdo booked for a rather soft foul. Referee also gives Huang Bowen a yellow for what appears to be a wardrobe malfunction.

68 mins: Langerak out quickly to deny Griffiths as Beijing again looking dangerous. Valdo definitely proving to be a handful for the Melbourne defence as he holding up the ball well.

74 mins: Pondeljak looking the most dangerous of the Melbourne midfielders as he somehow gets a corner. The resulting corner comes to nothing as Muscat header at the back post is cleared easily.

76mins: Both Liang Xu and Leijer go down in a fifty-fifty clash where both players missed the ball completely. Liang Xu had both studs up as he flew in for the tackle although to be fair Leijer’s effort wasn’t much better. Both players get up with the pitch appearing to come off the worse for wear as both players took a couple of divots.

79 mins: Melbourne Victory having a lot more of the possession at the moment as they press for an equaliser. Not creating many clear cut chances though. Are they leaving their run a little too late. Now would be an opportune to give Angulo a run.

82 mins: I get my wish as Broxham makes way for our second Costa Rican.

85 mins: Muscat puts a heavy challenge in on Joel Griffiths just for old times sake as Melbourne have an extended period of attacking. Unfortunately, it didn’t come to anything.

87 mins: Hernandez scuffs a shot inside the penalty area. Is Merrick’s pre-game prediction of fast finish about to come true? Not long after Mrdja gets on in the end of a near post header but it goes well wide.

89 mins: Melbourne spurn a brilliant chance to equalise after some brilliant interplay between Pondeljak and Ward. Unfortunately, Pondeljak’s cross failed to find a Melbourne body around the penalty spot. Best chance of the game so far which is saying something when it happens in the 89th minute.

90 +3 mins: The referee blows the whistle for full time with Melbourne’s second Asian Champions League campaign not getting off to the most auspicious of starts as they go down 1-0 to Chinese champions Beijing Guoan. Again it proved to be the Victory’s nemises, Joel Griffiths, who was the difference with a well taken goal. Melbourne will need to bounce back in the next match against Seongnam Ilhwa at Etihad Stadium in a couple of weeks to ensure any chance of progression from this group after this early setback.

Being that Melbourne is playing Beijing Guoan on Tuesday night I thought it would be an opportune time to find out some information about our opponents. However, being that my knowledge of Beijing Guoan is limited to it being the current club side of the Griffiths brothers (Joel and Ryan) and that they play in Beijing, I thought would be probably best to ask someone who knows much more about them. Therefore I asked Mike Tuckerman, regular The World Game and FourFourTwo contributor and Australian Football Weekly’s Asian football expert the questions to which we all want answers.

What style of play can we expect?

Beijing are a side that aren’t afraid to employ a physical style to get the better of their opponents. In Bosnian defensive midfielder Darko Matic they possess a steadying influence in the centre of the park, allowing the likes of Yang Xianchuang and Huang Bowen to push further forward. They’re also a cosmopolitan club, with Scottish defender Maurice Ross joining new Brazilian signing Valdo and of course Australian duo Ryan and Joel Griffiths in the squad.

Who are the dangermen?

Aside from the Griffiths brothers – who each scored eight league goals for Beijing last season – Brazilian striker Valdo also scored plenty of goals for relegated Hangzhou Greentown, so he could be something of an X-factor up front. Huang Bowen is likewise a handy presence in midfield, while skipper Xu Yunlong is the mainstay of the defence.

Where do you think Melbourne has the advantage?

This is Beijing’s third straight appearance in the Champions League. Having fallen at the group stage in their past two outings, Melbourne may have the psychological edge over a Guoan side under pressure to end China’s wretched run in Asia’s premier club competition.

How did they qualify?

By winning their first ever Chinese Super League title on the final day of the season. Beijing went into the final game of the season level on points with Henan Construction, but a 4-0 thumping of Hangzhou Greentown in front of more than 60,000 fans saw the capital club finish a point ahead of fast finishers Changchun Yatai.

How are they faring in the Super League?

The Super League hasn’t kicked off – and may not any time soon – with ongoing investigations into widespread match fixing meaning that the scheduled March 20 kick-off is tentative at best.

That hasn’t stopped Beijing from getting into shape, as Guoan started their pre-season training on February 5. Unfortunately a wild brawl in a friendly with defending Asian champions Pohang Steelers disrupted their focus somewhat, so Hong Yuanshou’s side will be itching to kick off competitive action in the Champions League.

It has been a big couple of days for Melbourne Victory with a series of big announcements. First up, we had the news that Michael Theoklitos would not be renewing his contract and would be heading overseas to try his luck.

This news is hardly surprising considering that the Victory had signed New Zealand international ‘keeper, Glen Moss before the end of last season. Theoklitos was one of the foundation players for the Victory and was a key component of the side for the last three seasons.

His stats for the record are: 72 games, 0 goals, 201 saves and 27 clean sheets. We wish him the best of luck with his endeavours overseas and I’m sure I speak for a lot of Victory fans when I say that we will miss chanting “Theo! Theo! Theo!” when a crucial save was made. “Moss! Moss! Moss!” or “Langerak! Langerak! Langerak!” just have the same ring to it.

My Michael Theoklitos highlights are as follows:

Favourite moment: Theoklitos’ crucial save in the dying moments of the 2006/07 semi-final against Adelaide shortly after we had taken the lead; Least favourite moment: Theoklitos’ brain snap that saw him stamp on Sasho Petrovski’s foot during last season; and the funniest moment was when he let Joel Griffiths know exactly how he felt about him by the use of an appropriate hand gesture.

Secondly, Melbourne finally confirmed the worst fears of all opposition supporters by signing captain, Kevin Muscat to a new three year deal. Only what’s different about this deal is that the deal is an one year playing and two year assistant coaching deal. So in many respects, this year will very much a testimonial year for Muscat although I am not sure how it’s going to work if (or should I say when) we progress from the ACL group stages next year.

Personally I think having Muscat involved in the coaching side of things is a good thing and it wouldn’t surprise me to see him take over the reins as Youth Team coach once he finally hangs up his boots. We definitely need Muscat for another year as we transition our defence to future years without him. It was also mentioned that Melbourne were sniffing around a state league player for their last signing. I would hazard a guess at it being some sort of defensive signing.

Finally, the other big news is that Melbourne Victory has finally joined the social networking scene by joining myself officially on twitter and also starting up an official Facebook page. So if you haven’t joined or started following them already - do so now.

As I said in my previous post, I was a little excited about Friday night’s game - first home game of the season and against Newcastle, a team for some reason I despise. Probably something to do with Joel Griffiths I’m sure. The afternoon pre-game was put also to good use, baiting members of my work’s Newcastle office.

Maybe, it was the first game of the season, or the fact there was no way I was going to wear my MV shirt from last year with “Patafta” on the back or most probably the effects of the beer drunk at after work drinks but I decided to dress up for the occasion - tie, vest, jacket, nice shirt, pants and shoes - you know the deal. Only problem, I don’t know how to tie a tie (don’t have to wear one for work) so I quickly learnt.

Anyway I was well rewarded for my dress sense with a 5-0 thumping of Newcastle and some excellent play from the Melbourne boys. The match started off slowly and I thought for a while it was going to be one of those nights where we dominate and then Joel Griffiths pops up in the 80th minute and bangs in the only goal of the game. But with a bit of tactical genius by Ernest Merrick (something you don’t hear me say to often), substituting an injured Thwaite for Archie Thompson, the flood of goals started as the Newcastle defence was made to look very ordinary. The main culprits being North and Covic.

There was a lot to be pleased about on Friday night - especially the way we played, but for me the standout players would have to be Hernandez, Lopez and Berger. An honourable mention goes to Ney Fabiano, who was unlucky not to get amongst the goals despite tireless running all night. I probably noticed his running more than mainly because of his running style. Make sure you have a look next time - its a bit odd. I am really enjoying our style of play at the moment and it makes for much more enjoyable viewing than what we were seeing same last season.

Was a bit disappointed with the crowd of only 22,000 - thought there would have been a few more with it being the first game of the season and all, but I guess everyone wasn’t as excited as I was. Hopefully in a couple of weeks time there will be a crowd of 30,000+ as we take on fellow league leaders, Adelaide.

And finally if you want to see me all dressed up for the game, visit here because it probably won’t happen again.

First home game of the season. A giant team poster in The Age. Hopefully a big crowd - I’m guessing around 26,000. A chance to boo Joel Griffiths. What more could you ask for? I’m a little excited!