Victory in Melbourne 

The title pretty much says it all and I’m not just talking about the performance against Adelaide. It also applies to their performance against the Wellington Phoenix on the preceding Wednesday as well. Never have I seen the Victory play such ordinary football in consecutive matches.

And the common denominator in both matches was Melbourne’s inability to get control in the all important midfield battle. This meant the defensive was always under constant pressure and the strikers weren’t getting enough of the ball. The Victory always plays well when they get can serious amount of midfield possession but both Adelaide and Wellington didn’t allow this to happen and when they did get possession it was often coughed up too quickly. Chief amongst the culprits was Billy Celeski, who hasn’t looked the player that he was before his knee construction. Whilst he hasn’t suffered the recurring injuries of both Thompson and Kemp, his form has definitely suffered and it would wise for Merrick to give him a couple of weeks break.

That all being said the Victory have certainly missed the presence of both Kruse and Thompson in attack with the combination of Danny Allsopp and Ricardinho yet to hit its straps as one would expect and maybe we as fans are expecting too much. Let’s hope they can both find some form against Sydney this weekend because another loss could spell disaster with teams like Melbourne Heart, Wellington Phoenix and Newcastle Jets all breathing down our neck for a finals position. What was looking like a comfortable finals finish a couple of matches ago has all of a sudden looked a tad precarious. What is of concern is those losses weren’t valiant losses, they were terrible, ugly losses and that more importantly needs to be rectified.

Whilst it was disappointing not to take all three points against the boys in baby blue on Saturday night the fact that there wasn’t a repeat of our last encounter was very welcoming as was the maintaining of our three point buffer at the top of the table.

What was really disappointing was the actions of a small minority of Melbourne fans who thought it was cool to be a hool’ and caused some some problems both before and after the game. For my full thoughts on this issue, you can read my latest 442 blog.

As for the game itself, Archie Thompson was immense creating numerous chances for both himself and his team-mates. However, unlike recent games, the goal of Clint Bolton lead a charmed life and the back of the net could not be found. Other standouts on the night were Matthew Kemp, who is in career best form, and Nick Ward who seemed to be everywhere and was providing that all important link between defence and attack. Ward has been a real revelation since returning to the squad and his form will be all important in the lead up to the finals campaign.

Saturday night’s game will certainly go down as one of the most exciting games we have seen so far in the short history of the A-League. And that’s just on the quality of the goals alone with five of the six scored being absolute crackers.

But the game was also the story of how Melbourne’s makeshift central pairing was unable to deal with the combined presence of van Djik and the slippery fish, Henrique. Matthew Kemp is probably one of the best right backs going around but as a central defender he looks a lot less assured.

Merrick’s other gamble of playing Nick Ward as Kemp’s replacement also didn’t work. And much like Fred’s exploitation of Greg Owens in the 2006/07 Grand Final, Henrique was too much of a handful for Henrique and left Kemp exposed too many times for everyone’s liking. From what we saw on Saturday night, Surat Sukha needs to be given a starting spot and a proper central defender is needed to shore up the currently leaky defence.

One person that seemed to be copping a lot from the crowd, was former Wellington Phoenix custodian, Glenn Moss, with the Victory faithful seeming to blame him for all our goals. This is extremely poor form by large sections of the crowd and in my latest blog 442 post I take them to task.

Carlos Hernandez, what else is there to say apart from - “We have been two years for you to score from a free kick!”