A-League Week 1

First week of the A-League and the highly anticipated clash of Emmo vs Kewell! Can't wait.

Here are the fixtures:

Newcastle Jets vs Melb Heart
Melb Victory vs Sydney FC
Brisbane Roar vs CC Mariners (Grand Final Replay!)
Gold Coast United vs Wellington Phoenix
Perth Glory vs Adelaide United

Game of the Round


VS


Sydney travel to Melbourne with their new look squad having reconstructed their problem defence with three signings in Socceroo Michael Beauchamp, Jamie Coyne and Dutch Eredivisie veteran Pascal Bosschaart. Marquee signing Brett Emerton will hopefully add a little more drive to Sydney's attack, which will be coordinated by Nick Carle, who will be keen to make a mark on the A-League this year. Nick Carle is pure class. Karol Kisel also comes back, part of Sydney's champion squad of 2009. However, questions remain over whether Sydney can get it altogether quick enough.

Melbourne has a new coach in Mehmet Durakovic and will look to further consolidate as an A-League powerhouse. The signing of superstar Harry Kewell certainly helps, and he almost guarantees bums on seats. He adds to possibly the most impressive attack in the country with Archie Thompson, Danny Allsop and J.C Solorzano. Melbourne have also recently signed a Brazilian left-back Fabio and exciting Kiwi talent Marco Rojas. Carlos Hernandez remains one of the A-League's top players.

Predicted Lineups:


Prediction: I want to say Sydney, but Melbourne look very strong... optimistically 2-2, but I could see Melbourne grabbing this 2-1. Kewell to score on debut

Hearts, Sydney, Marniers, Pheniox and Perth all to win!

S-Y-D N-E-Y
I AM SYDNEY TILL I DIE
WITH A KNICK NACK PADDY WACK GIVE A DOG A BONE!
GO ON MELBOURNE FCUK OFF HOME!

Going to a mates tonight to watch the game, should be good

Boys coming round too I wouldn't be surprised if it was a bit cagey or a draw as its the first game, but there's also a lot of attacking talent on the field.

Will be at the Roar game next week.

Yeah, i'm keen. I've signed up for fantasy, tipping and will hopefully get season pass soon

I may also go to Mariners vs Sydney at Sydney.

lszanto wrote:Yeah, i'm keen. I've signed up for fantasy, tipping and will hopefully get season pass soon

I may also go to Mariners vs Sydney at Sydney.

Did you get anyone else for fantasy? I guess I could do one now.

No clue, doesn't really bother me as I'll just use it to learn players names etc more than to try and do really well.

I'll do one anyway, you get to compete against the rest of Oz, and yeah.

Pity the best player in the League left to Asia- Marcos Flores

Sydney were better than Melbourne I think, but horrid in the final third. Carle should really haev been playing the hold, not Tony

Brisbane play beautiful but in saying that Mariners were still good, just couldn't finish off any of their counters.

Both Brisbane and Mariners both played better football than anything else I'd seen on the night, based on just the first game i'd rate them as the best A-League teams i've seen play over the years.

Hopefully when Mariners get their players back they'll be even better

Sydney, Melbourne may have been nil-all but it was a good nil-all draw. Good atmosphere, full crowd, football was pretty good. Yes, Sydney lacked a bit of cutting edge, but they also had their chances I believe. They should have scored.

I'd agree, Sydney probably slightly better until the red card killed their game.

Kewell showed some great touches and got some good shots away, bad luck with his header.

Bad luck with the penalty Emmo... Emmo wasn't bad, but they have to find a way to get him a bit more involved. Sydney's game was a team game though, not really any standouts, but they matched Melbourne all the way.

I tipped Marco Rojas to tear up the A-League this year and he was the MOM tonight for me. Amazingly talented player, great dribbler, tricky, fast and intelligent. Created so many of Melbourne's good plays. Real shame he's a bloody Kiwi and not Aussie

Went to the pub and missed most of the CCM vs Roar game, but it looked good, and a nice goal from Roar.

BarcaKizz wrote:Sydney, Melbourne may have been nil-all but it was a good nil-all draw. Good atmosphere, full crowd, football was pretty good. Yes, Sydney lacked a bit of cutting edge, but they also had their chances I believe. They should have scored.

I'd agree, Sydney probably slightly better until the red card killed their game.

Kewell showed some great touches and got some good shots away, bad luck with his header.

Bad luck with the penalty Emmo... Emmo wasn't bad, but they have to find a way to get him a bit more involved. Sydney's game was a team game though, not really any standouts, but they matched Melbourne all the way.

I tipped Marco Rojas to tear up the A-League this year and he was the MOM tonight for me. Amazingly talented player, great dribbler, tricky, fast and intelligent. Created so many of Melbourne's good plays. Real shame he's a bloody Kiwi and not Aussie

Went to the pub and missed most of the CCM vs Roar game, but it looked good, and a nice goal from Roar.

Yeah, maybe it's just me but they need a striker, like a good 9 to finish off chances, Bridge even when he was on was almost non-existant.

Rojas was epic, beating his man constanly and apart from not cutting back to Kewell he was perfect. I think the keepers probably deserve a mention as MOM's but in terms of outfield players definetly Rojas.

Was a great game, the goal capped off a great piece of passing. Watching that game wasn't like I was watching A-League, it was just leaps and bounds ahead and I loved watching it, Mariners couldn't hold possesion but they countered decently but got caught by Brisbanes high line.

4-3-3 <3

I guess now you see why I was heaping praise on Brisbane. They've lost some key players but I think they can rebuild. They are just class.

And yeah, I agree we could do with a really good striker. To be fair, we have 4 pretty good strikers who could play in most other A-League teams, but we don't have one really good striker. Melbourne have 3 really. I think Bridge and Cazarine are in the top few in the league, but both have their major flaws. Bridge's mobility is better for the system, but Cazarine scored a lot of goals last year.

Yeah, Reddy and Velaphi were very good...

Yeah definetly they were top class, their coach has done a great job of replacing the stars that left. They are very fluid in their play but I would say with the amount of control they had they really should have had 2-3 goals.

True, playing Carle striker just seemed a very obsecue choice to me as he's somebody you want in behind your forwards making that final ball and creating. Even if Bridge and Carazine were up front with Carle in behind I think it could have worked alot better.

2 out of 3 tips right so far

Games between Jet's and Heart was BS.
We should have won, but our defense looks reallyyyy shaky on the counter-attack.

But Fred IS BACK!

Edit: Kizz +1 top review!

Kewell had a few great touches, but majority of his game was horrible.

Emerton started off great. When he missed the penalty he just went downhill on confidence.

The way I saw it, anyway.

HI NEW GUY, DO WHATEVER YOU WANT.

Disclaimer: We (dostoevsky included) generally treat this section as a muck-around section, much to Kizz's disapproval .

aye^

Storm1 wrote:Hello.

I see there is no specific thread for the Wellington Phoenix FC...if at all possible, I would like to add a Nix thread...please?

Storm? Old Storm?

beatrixasdfghjk. wrote:HI NEW GUY, DO WHATEVER YOU WANT.

Disclaimer: We (dostoevsky included) generally treat this section as a muck-around section, much to Kizz's disapproval .

Hi. Thank you very much. I am a girl a 27 year old girl.

BarcaKizz wrote:

Storm1 wrote:Hello.

I see there is no specific thread for the Wellington Phoenix FC...if at all possible, I would like to add a Nix thread...please?

Storm? Old Storm?

Yes, it is Storm without the 'Old' Its wonderful to be back and might I add...Great forum.

I ≠ recognise ):

beatrixasdfghjk. wrote:I ≠ recognise ):

Thanks for the recognition.

Today 5:00pm NZT the Wellington Phoenix play against Adelaide United FC and it's a first for the Nix and Adelaide at Auckland's Eden Park where our All Blacks won the Rugby World Cup against France...So the boys are hoping that some of that winning magic will be cast over them. I hope so as well because they have been playing like rubbish.

I meant the storm of old, oh well... welcome back. Behave yourself lol, though you won't have your best mate jay to keep you company.

Personally I would like a bit more football discussion in this section, so anything you add about the A-League, All Whites or NZ talents would be most welcome.