I have to agree with that.

A decent defender but kicks the ball like he had bricks for feet. You can never win titles if players like that are in the first XI.

Well that was a much improved performance on the previous game - with about as much improvement again to be back at the level we have been at times this season.

At the ground it felt like Elder was letting a lot of physical stuff and professional fouls slip by, as well as time wasting by Birigitti right from the start. Stajic's game plan was obviously one to frustrate us and slow the game down which they did well.

I saw a couple of incidents where players slid in with studs exposed, but when nobody got hit by it the ref did not penalise that action - like when Danzaki and Nisbet were racing for a ball from different directions and Danzaki was the closer, but Nisbet launched at the ball from a distance and slid in with studs exposed making Danzaki pull out of the challenge because of it. Still dangerous play and without it Danzaki was away on the left wing. No contact and Nisbet knocked the ball out but the incident itself should have been viewed as a cardable offence for both the danger and the loss of attacking opportunity.

Enough on the ref - watched the game on Kayo when I got home and was surprised that what felt like bad refereeing all game at the ground did not seem like such bad refereeing on the replay. Atmosphere and more of a grasp of the tension in the game at the ground maybe. Also when the camera is not pointing at a player like Birigitti as he slowly walks to the far side of the goal, places the ball and adjusts it millimetre perfect, dawdles back, knocks his boots against the pole, and so on, you don't feel the time drag as much.

We struggled to get into the game and find our flow - did not settle all game really. Still too many misplaced passes early on but we succumbed to Mariner's pressure and physicality and got put off our game more than it warranted. When we chose to think and pass we made our way through their press very effectively.

Tongyik was unbeatable the way we were playing against him but we did not have the sense to change our methods to test him as much as we could have. Champness was only held when they double teamed him but we then failed to capitalise on the fact they had an extra player round him and find where they were a man down. Very dangerous performance by Joey - also a big call out to the effort he put into defence too this week.

DWH got owned by Tongyik most of the game but he still produced good play. Danzaki ran his legs off in both directions and produced more of his normal play. A few good chances produced but a drop from our normal attack level. Probably the wet more than tiredness at that end.

Dehmie had some very nice touches but I think is about to find how much harder the aleague is. Shows promise. Parsons contributed again well. He does add something potent both individually and in combination when he comes on.

Our defence was wobbly again. We should not require brilliant saves and frequent perfectly timed last ditch intervention and mis-hits to keep a clean sheet. The run of games is definitely taking the spring and reaction out of our legs. Gillesphey again got stuck once against a player driving into the box and unable to produce the quick reaction he has shown over two seasons now which to me has to be sluggish legs.

It reads like a lot of gloomy observations, but we actually had a pretty good game against a well structured and capable side.

I was really surprised how much we passed back and across in the wet. Every time I expected the ball to suddenly hold up and have a Mariner's player swoop and score. The middle ground was obviously much better than the corners, but it made me nervous all the same.

It was a result of sorts for us. My new shirt struggled to both keep the rain off and lift our play - so a clean sheet draw is not a bad outcome. I won't take it back to Rebel as a faulty product yet.

It's going to be very interesting to see how the club manages a summer season at Moreton Daily Stadium if we come up against typical Brisbane and summer storms. With no drainage, there is a chance we'll be playing on a flooded pitch a lot more often than we would like.
For me, I get the feeling we are at the point where our busy schedule has caught up to us, and no amount of rotation is going to help (especially when our rotation includes NPL players getting their debuts and Gol Gol, who is rubbish). I got this feeling mostly during the city game, where we weren't putting any effort into pressing/chasing the ball and I thought it could only be Moon trying to manage the players/schedule. 
We were in good form, but there isn't much that can be done with no proper recovery/rest period between games, which is a shame, as I think if things weren't as busy, we'd be much more likely to win these games. 

With the crazy busy schedule it becomes a lottery what happens next.Lose a few games and the wheels could fall off.Win a few and we are contenders.
Its pretty hard to grind out wins without fresh legs though.

Summer does give the ground more of a chance to dry out between storms though - so less sodden day after day and more just the instant flooding factor in our big storms to deal with. Our days long storm events will wipe us out at Moreton Daily Stadium every time as you say though.

I agree that the schedule has caught us up but i think this will be the low point physically. the bodies adapt to the new schedule and players will start to feel better and better in the new routine so will run games out better (as long as injuries stay away, if a player picks up a niggle it will be there to stay). 

I had been a bit critical of champness's defensive effort but it was up there last night, so well done, however it did noticeably take it's toll as he was very ineffective after about 65mins. DWH put in a huge amount of defensive work but with the deeper line we were playing it was all for nothing and took away his attacking threat. Last night was a game for him to be a bit lazy defensively and try and hit the mariners in attack but it never came. 

we were lucky to not concede, but then again we could have also scored so a draw is probably a fair result from the game. now we go against ADL, hopefully the boys are up for it because it will no doubt be a physical game. 

Apparently Jamie is now wanted at the Roar next year. So that's good.
However both Courtney-Perkins and Powell are looking elsewhere. Be disappointing if they go. 

All the teams above us won except AU.
Effectively ,if we dont beat AU ,i think we are struggling .as far as top five,with our run home.

Beating Adelaide is our best chance at keeping in touch, and the game behind means we are always having to win just to hold our place rather than overtaking anyone.

We could lose to Adelaide and beat Newcastle and still be in 6th place on 34 after 22 games - and still only a win off second.

The Glory game is our actual catch up game and that is not till 2 June - so until then we are going to be a game behind and playing hard to stay in the 6.

Beat the teams above us and we overtake them like some sort of self fulfilling prophecy - win and we are above and should have won - lose and we stay below and should have lost.

Up to us to play to our potential and not continue with the poorer form we have been showing.

Well that was a disappointing game - starting with the team line-up.

Wrong game to start Dehmie. He should have been started as one new face up front rather than thrown into a side with neither of our two best goal scorers and lacking our only genuine creative midfielder.

Bringing Mebratru on did nothing to help our effort and contributed to the poorer performance.

Our best line-up available tonight could have won that game (especially with Adelaide having players out too) but the team we fielded took an hour to find their feet and work out some cohesion - and then only because we had more of our normal players on. We played disjointed and lacked fluidity, confidence and control. Some periods we held the ball well and passed well, but they were all toothless attacks. I don't mean that they just did not score - I mean that as a blindly orange spectator I never felt like we were going to get a goal. Even when we got a pen I thought we would not get the ball in the net.

Not just one of those nights - our second string players are not up to this level when we have so many key players out and so many of the second string players on. Or at least not up to this level until they have played together in that combination over several consecutive games.

Smacked of an experimental side but I don't know if that is the case.

We are better than that performance as a club, and we had the chance to field a better team than that - and that makes the disappointment that much greater than losing a winnable game.

Brindell-South is a big loss to us in attack. He looked in so much pain, poor bloke.

On a positive note - I am hoping Moon deliberately put the team out there to give some life back to tired legs with a "just do the best you can" mindset. I can live with that.

Moon had to give some rest to the DWH,Danzaki and JOS.Otherwise they would  start to get injuries.Champness also looks done.His head is somewhere else.
Unfortunately we dont have much depth and constant changing of the side is making it more difficult.
I think its fair to say ,we will struggle for the remaining games.A bit sad because we were hitting form before this ridiculous schedule.But how can you play your  best when every game is fitness management?
Realistically we are now fighting for 6th.But its all academic because we will be shot ducks when the finals come around.😔

Even though Adelaide were quite poor tonight, Brisbane never looked dangerous and never looked likely to score.
Even with the penalty, as soon as I saw Champness was going to take it I had little confidence that he would convert, and when I saw him doing the ridiculous prancing pony run-up I was even more convinced he would miss.
My choice for penalty taker would have been Gillesphey.

5 of the 6 teams playing tonight played good football - even Wanderers played pretty well despite the score line.

My concern is that if/when we get our first team back on the park, they will not have played together for so long that it will be like pre-season games for a while.
Hard to build the cohesion and form needed for finals games in these circumstances.

☹️☹️☹️
In hindsight i think Moon screwed up with managing the Roars tough schedule.But  no other clubs have done particularly well either.Its just some  have greater depth.
We just have a lack of depth and have had the toughest run of games in a short space of time.
I really believe for Roar a better plan would have been to have a first team play twice a week,like every weekend and a second team play the extra midweek game.
You can still have first team players reserving for twenty minutes.
The second team could probably defend for a draw most games.But having the first team together gives the best chance for wins.
A rotation squad looks shoddy and we can see loses more often and struggles to win.

My thoughts exactly :laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh:

That sentence in itself is a damning statement on a clubs philosophy and style of play.

Lots of long balls and lots of simple passes going to the opposition.
It really was a case of poor quality .AU were not much better,but just enough to win.Which is sad in itself because AU have been in poor form.

You gotta question the logic of running so many consecutive games with 3/4 days recovery. 
It detracts from the quality of games and is now becoming damage control for some teams. 
How is that good for the quality of the ALeague?
i know overseas has times like this but they have bigger squads with more quality.
thats not the case here. 
Bris v Adelaide was ordinary game for both teams. 
Whose running this league??
Extend the season and give the players time to recover. !!!

I think the league is just looking to complete the season within contractual guidelines. Once that is out of the way I expect they are looking at broadcast deals, recruiting, pre-season, and hopefully more control over the playing environment than they have had to date.

I think that is hitting the club with more than is fair in this environment.

Our playing style is great when we have our full squad and it can handle lesser skilled/experienced players rotating through perfectly well.

We were improving steadily as the normal season was progressing (taking the flying start out of the equation), put too much faith in a self-serving turncoat to fill a specific need, and are now suffering badly from injury and fatigue on top of that.

What we are seeing now is not our playing style or club's philosophy - we are seeing a whole lot of people doing the best they can with the limitations we are facing.

Can't put that on the club.

I am disappointed in our progress now because of what we could have achieved - but I am proud of this club, both staff and players, and how we are battling through this.

Fascinating that MB’s have signed Davilla for $750k a season for three seasons.Some big money .Then you have MC, SFC,WSW,MV &WU who seem to have deep pockets.Basically all the Melbourne and Sydney teams.
We are really at the low end of the competition when it comes to budget.

But our uninterested owner has just as much money.

You kind of can. 

Once you have a structure and philosophy, you buy the players for that, or you develop the players for that. If we were reliant on one person, then that is terrible mismanagement and development. 

Can also put it on the club that we haven't really progressed throughout the years and we end up at the point where we are in which we don't really perform. 

I wouldnt say we havent progressed it is just our progression has not been focused immediately on the top team. since we last won a GF we have reshaped our football department (which was an absolute shambles) into something that should resemble a functioning department, safeguarding (or at least having an overarching guiding philosophy on) the way the roar play and develop players. we have also instituted an proper academy system to develop players (which is more of a long term prospect, probably wont see the effects of it for another 3-5 years). 

In the 10 or so years that the Bakries have been in charge, the club has matured a hell of a lot. it hasnt always been smooth sailing and there have been backwards steps along the way but if you look at how the club was run from 2006-2011 it is light and day. we may not be playing like the Ange/Broich Era but that was built on the back of 2 extraordinary individuals who changed the a-league, the club was still a functioning shambles (though there was a brief moment of good management when the FFA parachuted Eugenie Buckley into the CEO roll. It was probably the best thing any sports body has ever done, and i am very surprised that no footballing body has picked her up again). 

I still think the club is generally going in the right direction, we have a base to work on with a guiding philosophy, an academy to produce players (and coaches) used to the style of play, and a functioning football department. one huge missing link though is a permanent training base that the club can call its own, (a stadium would be nice but i dont think it is needed for the first team to perform)

Everyone has the same amount of money to spend. I'm wondering, if the money they're giving Davilla, means they know how much the salary cap will be next year. Or do we already know that number?

I understand what you are saying, but I disagree that our current challenges lie at the clubs feet.

In our top squad we had the players to play the type of football we wanted to - with the exception of a good defensive mid in my opinion. Our style of play was evolving and we were producing the sort of football that on paper we did not have the names to play.

We filled one specific linking role with someone who had their own interests at heart, and regardless of being contracted left us in the lurch.

The intense game schedule has worn our players down to the point where we are forced to rely on multiple bench players in the starting side - but had the schedule not done that they were all excellent up and coming players to be introduced in a managed fashion and further improve the quality of the side over time and into the future.

The club did not create the situation, and it has crippled our run to the finals this year.

We can blame the club for not having more 'names' on the bench like many other sides, but not the playing style or philosophy - which in my view would have produced the type of game play that we demand from Roar sides, along with the success and future proofing of the squad.

We are not performing, because we have run out of legs and the coach is having to put in the best assortment he can every 3-4 days instead of what he planned to do with the squad we had playing one game a week. I think Moon (under our direction of course) had settled pretty much all our positions in a 'regular' starting side before injuries and fatigue put us well behind.

Really, and Glory don't have just as gruelling a schedule as your team. Have you heard any whingeing from them! Or trying to use as many excuses, as is possible, to explain why they might not make the finals.

Back under your bridge mate.

Were talking about something very specific that had nothing to do with finals but a skimming troll could not pick that up.

Make an effort.

We last won the GF in 2014. Can you really say we have progressed since then? I get what you are saying about development of the academy and the football department but that would require results on the field to change too to show its success. If that is not happening, then it means that either the development of these things is too slow or that it is not being done right. 




Other than Macdonald and injuries, the club is responsible for the fortunes of the club. That's like saying you should not be responsible for your actions. The club is partly responsible for the playing style. Like sirchdobo said, they implemented a football department that is responsible for developing philosophy and style, so that would mean if that is failing, then it is the what the club implemented that is causing that. 

The club should not have put all their eggs in one basket with Macdonald, and they should developed a better transfer policy if they knew they had areas to address. 

I'm not going to blame the club for everything, but I also don't want to kid myself in to thinking that we have progressed in the way we should be. 

I added a word to the underlined part - that I can wholeheartedly agree with. The schedule has hurt us more than the club had control over and that I excuse the club from.

I know from previous discussions that you did not see much potential or improvement in the side even when we were playing our normal schedule, and that following some bad seasons my level of acceptance may have been lowered compared to the performances of our previous great sides.

I think that is where most of our difference in perspective comes into this discussion now.

I was happy with how we were progressing this season, and had we not had the hectic schedule, or McDonald's flip, I think we would still be keeping City honest at the top, or at the least well in the fight for second. On that basis I do not see the club 'responsible' for where we are now. We could not have expected or planned for this and we did not have the depth we now need as compared to a normal season.

I do not compare us to other clubs whose pockets and/or recruiting have allowed them more depth. I compare us to ourselves in a hypothetical normal season and I think the club had us positioned very well in that sense.