Wrapping up Week 3 of the A-League | Thebigtip

Another week down for the A-League, with the middle three matches being bookended by the most exciting two matches of the round – one at Adelaide and the other in Melbourne. Of course, that doesn’t mean Adelaide v Melbourne Victory because the result of that is obvious enough *takes a mental note for when United defeat Victory in a few weeks*. Straight onto the Friday night match at Hindmarsh.

 Adelaide 3 defeated Melbourne Heart 2

The first match on the Friday night is starting to make a little bit of a fool of me. First a 2-0 prediction becomes 3-3, and then a 0-0 prediction becomes 3-2! In fairness though, I doubt anyone could have called this scoreline after Van Dijk went down in the warm-up and then spent the early stages of the match in the dressing room reading the matchday program. I’m sure it was a quality read.

It was probably the best the Heart have looked so far in their three games. If you take out the errors that gifted Adelaide their first two goals, on the whole the Heart showed signs of improvement that will come as they play more games together. My biggest surprise was the performance of Worm in the midfield. It wasn’t anything nearing a MOTM performance, but after his goal he started to show some a little bit on the ball which would have been a good signal considering he’d shown approximately nothing in the his first two appearances.

For Adelaide, Leckie was absolutely immense along with Flores. The two of them were clearly the best players on the park for mine – especially Flores. He will rip this league to shreds in the second half of the season if he can stay fit. Here’s where I’m supposed to write something about Ramsay, but it’s only a couple of hours after the game at the moment, so all I can see is his name on the bench of my fantasy team on Fox Sports. If ever the Fuuuu comic was appropriate.

Perth 1 defeated Newcastle 0

Watching the game yesterday, immediate thoughts were that Newcastle had gone way too defensive. As much as I advocated Wheelhouse trying to get fists flying from the outset, the general mindset from the Jets was too much on matching the physicality from Perth, and not enough on creating their own play. The foul count supports that – Newcastle ‘won’ it 20 to 8.

I kept a close eye on Zadkovich when he was close to the ball, and he looks like he’s really struggling at the moment. While he’s on the ball he doesn’t seem to be creating anything or doing his job properly. He was caught out of position a few times as well – it’s hard to be too critical given he’s still settling in to the new surroundings, but his performance is definitely something to keep tabs on. He and also Wehrmann (who from now on in any column will be referred to as Stone Cold Steve Austin) were disappointing. Stone Cold was good defensively, but he wasn’t providing anything going forward, which basically summed up Newcastle’s day.

As for Perth, they were very, very solid all around the park – and the introduction of Jelic gave them the spark that they needed. It says a lot about the quality of their squad when a player like Jelic has to bide his time on the bench when he could start at almost every other A-League club. Surely somehow Mitchell has to work Jelic into the starting line-up, because he’s too good a player to be sitting on the bench and working as an impact sub every week.

Yesterday was Fowler’s best performance so far. I like the way he’s settled into more of an assisting role rather than trying to get on the scoresheet multiple times himself. It seems to be the best way to use him given the range of options that Perth have at their disposal at any one time – who better to play the deft balls in behind the defence than Fowler?

Brisbane 1 defeated Sydney 0

The main interest in this game was seeing how Sydney would respond to last week and the subsequent loss of Brosque from the team. Pretty much from the outset you could see they weren’t up to it with the way Brisbane were pressing them all over the park. In my preview I wrote that Lavicka didn’t have much of a choice with the line-up that he had at his disposal, so he’s excused for now. What I disliked was the complete lack of effort the Sydney players were putting in. The majority of 50-50 balls were won by the Brisbane players simply because they wanted it more, which isn’t good enough.

As previously mentioned, the standout of Brisbane’s performance was the way they pressed and hassled Sydney when they were without the ball. In ways, it was similar to what Sydney were doing to opponents last season when they were on the top of their game. With a young side I can’t see them sustaining the pressure over the season, but while they are pressing it’s a treat to watch, and that combined with the way they move the ball with pace are reasons why they’re fast shooting up the list of the teams I like to watch.

A big part in that movement and pressing has been Broich. I think I mentioned him in the wrap of the game against Gold Coast, but he was even better yesterday. He stayed involved in the game for more of the 90 this time, compared to the 45 against Gold Coast – and you could see the difference it made all around the park. Out of all the signings so far, he’d have to be right up there after the first few weeks.

Brisbane v Wellington this Friday night should be a cracker. As for Sydney, they’ll have to hope that the return of Bridge & Brosque solve their problems, because even though it would be absurd to write them off, there’s definitely a few troubles that need to be worked on at this early stage.

Wellington 2 defeated Central Coast 0

There’s really not too much to say about the game. Wellington did what they were supposed to do – which is a sign of a good side. At the end of the season there’ll be too many games where fans of any side can point at a game and say – we should have got the three points out of that. Minimising that to as few points as possible will probably be the key between a double chance/home final and opening on the road.

Central Coast were toothless all day long. They could have played for a week and probably not scored, which will be a problem on their away trips during the season. They found themselves behind and Arnold decided not to empty his bench or change the formation. Surely when you’re playing a side with an injured keeper you have to try something to get him moving and see what happens.

Both of Wellington’s goals were excellent and it was tough for me to pick the goal that I thought was better. Eventually I decided I preferred the second goal, so instead of me doing the talking, I’ll let the video explain everything: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gO9To_I6W_0

Melbourne 2 drew with North Queensland 2

Firstly – match of the season, hands down. I’m willing to call it now that there won’t be another match that contained everything the match today had in it. Red cards, contentious decisions, good football, a livid crowd, and a twist ending. What more can you want from a game?

Where to start? I may as well go with all the penalty shouts. The penalty for Melbourne’s first was definitely there, as was the penalty for Melbourne’s second. Some people are saying he was outside the box, but Kellaway doesn’t get caught by the right foot. He jumps over that, lands, and then gets caught by the left foot which is hanging just inside the box – so definitely a penalty. As for the three shouts in quick succession by Melbourne, the first was definitely there. Pasfield sweeps Mate’s legs as he gets to his feet, so that’s enough contact for a penalty. The latter two weren’t penalties in my eyes, so it wasn’t a complete disaster by the referee on that front. As for the Fury’s penalty, I can understand why it was paid after the warning – but if that gets paid every time it happens in a game, the final score’s going to be 10-9 for the majority of games. It was very soft.

As for the first red card, my initial reaction was that it was a definite send off. However, after about 87 (that’s only a slight exaggeration) viewings of the replay I can see why people are aggrieved about the decision – but to me I can still understand why the red was paid from the angle the referee was in. As for the second red card to Akoto, that definitely wasn’t there. That’s clear as day – what I couldn’t believe was Michael Lynch insinuating that Muscat had said something racist to Akoto to provoke the push. Maybe if he watched what was going on he’d realise that Muscat was simply stepping on Akoto’s mouthguard. Nothing more, nothing less and to suggest something that serious is a massive slur against Muscat’s character. Even though his playing style isn’t going to win him many admirers, racist slurs are a completely different thing.

As far as ... you know, the play on the field goes; I thought Akoto (before his red) and especially Hughes were amazing again. The way Hughes marshals the back four is amazing, and his habit of peeling off his defender to make a goal-line clearance worked brilliantly well just before the break for half time. Surely Hughes is rivalling Broich as the season's best signning. To get a former reserve captain of Everton at the age of 23 (for assumingly peanuts), is an amazing get, and a major reason why their defence has been so much more solid than last season.

So that’s the wrap-up for Week 3. I did promise that in every preview/review column I’d have a clue as to who I’d be interviewing from the A-League. However, I’ve made an error and forgot to think about a clue for this column, so until next time – follow me on Twitter (rickm18) and/or leave any comments about the weekend of games below.