I absolutely agree that this result has been coming.
De Jong looks like he isn’t trying very hard and doesn’t get involved nearly as much as you would like from your marquee but his touches are still our best outlet for creating chances, so I wouldn’t be dropping him. Having said that De Silva absolutely needs to start. I would swap De Jong for a rested Brousque, bringing SDJ more central as a second striker would get him more involved and playing him with De Silva would give him the kind of quick thinking, creative player he needs to work with.
The only other changes I would be looking at are, maybe Caceras for Oneill or Brillante, just to get our movement in the midfield a bit faster and Jop or Warland for Calver, as good as Calver has been as a stop gap, his distribution just isn’t great. Also Retre at RB isn’t really working so it might be an idea to try Tratt there until Grant returns.
Also, was pretty impressed with Ivanovic again, has a good workrate and some very tidy footwork.
I do definitely agree with giving Caceres a start. The ONeill/Brillante pairing has become a bit complacent without having much pressure for spots because they’ve been so dominant. Caceres for Brillante might be a good warning to the squad as a whole
He seems to have one moment per game where he thinks he’s injured and his career is over - then he’s up again, but doesn’t get as involved for the rest of the game.
We’re carrying him at that point and we’re not playing well enough to do that.
I hadn’t thought of this but I’d be up for it. Caceres provided a lot off the bench yesterday and he would be good at shuttling the ball from defensive midfield to attack. For whatever reason our two DM plan just isn’t working this season.
And yeah @Belldiouf this does feel like it has been coming. We’ve had our cracks papered over by red cards and a bit of luck. What’s worrying is that Corica either hasn’t noticed or doesn’t know how to fix things.
Also how would people feel about a change of shape to play a 4-2-3-1? I feel like the flat 4-4-2 just isn’t working and it making us overly reliant on balls over the top to a fast front two. We looked so much better when we changed formation. Doing that would allow us to start Ninko, DDS and De Jong, while also taking the creative pressure off any one of those players. It would also allow us to rest Brosque and use him as an impact sub or a plan B where we can change back to a 4-4-2.
It seems to be coming at regular intervals now ie when we play better teams who can ruthlessly expose our poor starts.
After Wellington, going a goal down to the Wanderers and the Coast you’d think that’d be enough to be a catalyst for some tweaks.
We saw at the end of last season how stagnation (and the acl of course) finally came to bite us in the arse in the finals.
Not sure we can continue this same static approach with an older squad and the replacements (Le Fondre aside) being a downgrade from last season.
I know a balance must always be struck, but would just love see to a little more pro-activity from the manager and that is NOT simply giving a kid 10 mins off the bench.
Regarding the above chatter, I actually said a couple of weeks back (pre Caceras signing) that the midfield balance seemed off and that id be open to dropping one of Oneil or Brillante for somebody with a little more drive and industry. Retre being the obvious example.
Would love to be a fly on the wall when someone suggests this to Corica (if this has even happened).
“But, but those 2 are the first picked, it’s worked for years!”
Zullo has just fallen off a cliff. His positioning is awful and his balls into the box are mostly useless. He had the best cross for a fullback by far the last few seasons.
One thing though is this stagnant 4 or so guys around the edge of the box playing into 2 men up front, does not help him at all. That’s never going to work with Perths back 3, especially with the size of their CBs. The same thing happened with Wellington. Their 3 big boys laughed at every ball in all game.
It seems like we cant really break down well drilled sides that set up properly, save for a piece of brilliance.
The ‘isnt trying hard enough’ is bullshit. Peoples demeanors are different. Just because hes not howling at the moon all game doesnt mean he isnt trying.
We need to try to play him as an out an out 10 or a genuine wide man who gets space early. Not this bullshit narrow attacking midfielder nonsense. Perth just eat that up,
This has been an issue for weeks and was really noticeable early on when Retre had a couple of chances to deliver into the box in quick succession. Brosque and ALF were already in there, but static and marked, whilst all other midfielders were top of the box. No one making a late run into the box, easy to defend, meat & drink for their CB’s.
Corica needed to make some changes. Using the argument that it was a top of the table clash so the best starting XI was required falls a bit flat in the professional era. It’s a condensed schedule at this time of year. Poppa made fresh changes and had the right idea. Perhaps with the short turnaround + transit to Perth, Corica felt there wasn’t enough time to make changes (most of the prep would’ve been recovery).
Simplistically, Performance = Fitness - fatigue, and the unit value of the second half of that equation is getting larger among our main starting XI. Of course there are other variables involved, but it’s hard to deny Corica hasn’t liked making too many changes to his team sheet.
With a combined 10hr transit time + 3 games in 1 week, Stevie will need to make several changes to the starting XI vs Adelaide.
Spoiler: he won’t.
Whenever there’s a success, he rewards the 11 who got it with another start; whenever there’s a failure, he gives the 11 the opportunity to make amends (and these guys usually do - it’s just there’s been a huge amount of luck with a lot of these).
Corica will only make changes due to enforced absence.
Has there been a single starter this season where form or tactics was the factor? There was talk that Jop was about to be dropped for Calver, but Wilko got injured, and then Jop himself so we never got to see that play out in any way.
So that was our first HAL loss outside NSW in nearly 3 years, since 26/03/16 when we lost 3-2 at Suncorp, the game where Holosko got a late equaliser but Roar went straight through us like a dodgy curry from the subsequent kick-off and scored an even later winner. That was coincidentally the last time we conceded 3 goals in normal time up until the recent Wellington game at Kogarah.
In the nearly three years since that Suncorp game we’ve only been beaten in NSW 7* times:
2-0 by Adelaide the week after (Djite double with assists from Zac Anderson & Riley Woodcock)
1-0 by Wanderers at ANZ, only loss of the double season
2-0 at Bluetongue, go the Horses
2-1 at Newy, when they had 10 men in Nabbout’s last game
2-1 at Allianz against Brisbane last season
2-1 at Kogarah against MV
3-1 at Kogarah against Welly
we don’t talk about extra time games.
We did also lose 2 away FFA Cup Finals during that period. But fucking hell, we had a good run.