Schwarzer pulled off some excellent saves in that second half. Mind you, Chelsea weren't parking the bus so much as creating a bus depot.

Jedi sort of at fault for that goal gave toure way too much space some guys dressed as the phantom playing for palace also.

Edited by jas88: 28/4/2014 01:23:47 AM

Gerrard's shots from distance were troubling him a little.

Adrian Mariappa's into his S&M. Been reading too much 50 shades of Grey. :lol: :lol: :lol:

jedinaks ball skills uncharacteristically decent this match :-k

Cap him.

Actually, that may not be so bad a thing - Hearts are hopefully almost out of Administration now, via local millionaire and Hearts fan Anne Budge and the Fan-based, Foundation of Hearts, group.

They will be joined by Rangers in the second tier next season and the famous blue-half of Glasgow and they will be heavy favourites to top the 2014/15 Champ for promotion back up for the 15/16 SPL. TBH Rangers will surely dominate, but Hearts should be a clear enough second and a strong chance to win through the qualification play-off too. With Budge in-control and the TF Embargo lifted they should be able to sign some more 'experienced' players too, something their young, but talented squad desperately needs.

Dylan McGowan has played at this level before, not too long ago, via a loan stint and it should 'genuinely' only be a temporary/short-term drop down. At worst it should take them two seasons to see promotion, if say Rangers, as expected, secure the top, automatic promotion place and Hearts lose in the promotion play-off scenario (2nd to 4th place- But that would then leave them clear of the big/unusual scenario of a having to compete for automatic promotion with huge rival club like Rangers, in the following season.

Dylan McGowan is still 'relatively' young and even inexperienced, yet, he's one of the more experienced/'capped', senior, players in their 'present' squad. The more he features and stars, the more kudos for a lad who's come up through their youth system since his mid-teens and the more likely his status will remain elevated once the experienced/quality recruits are brought in.

Where, elsewhere, in the SPL or League One/Two in England, he would just be another 'squaddie' in the defensive rotation of more clubs than less. The 22 going 23 year old can build up his resume at Heart, adding a further 30-40 caps next season to the roughly 90 senior appearances he's accumulated in his career so far. That would also take him closer to 100 appearances for Heart. The then 23 going 24 year old would then be a key player in a team re-entering the SPL and a much more attractive prospect down south or where ever. Though again, even remaining at Heart could again bring more promise as their new ownership regime shows a potentially very promising long term future - with 'Fan Ownership' being the goal, 5 years or so down the line!

Once Heart are re-promoted, with their highly promising new ownership regime, with the quality and experience of their younger talent combined with quality signings - they could be right back up there challenging the Top 3, giving Celtic and Rangers a right push, just as they were at their strongest, just a few seasons ago!

Edited by GloryPerth: 28/4/2014 02:08:12 AM

Is there a YT clip with Halloran's latest goal - alot of you guys have described it as a 'better than average' effort, at the least - Hopefully the rest of us can check it out?!



Interesting to hear, thanks for that guys. One wonders how Ange views him and if he may consider that?! Though with Bresc and Rogic about, as too our weakness/lack of depth on the flanks, Oar may just have to remain out there... Less Troisi slots in out there and Oar switched in middle - perhaps as some kind of more offensively minded, quicker, counter-attacking threat (With Leckie upfront and Halloran RW aswell?)?

I just saw that WC preview show and the interview with the Netherlands coach, Van Gaal, he emphasised how they utilise a 4-3-3 and seek to full press.

So, dare I say, Ange's tactical approach utilised against CR may've been some kind of preliminary preparation for, atleast the likes of they, aswell as Chile.

So mobility and quick processing/agility from our front half, as too ground coverage in our own tracking back and pressing, could be the part of the approach we seek, to exploit their higher lines? :-k

Leckie, Halloran, Oar, potentially Rogic and Troisi could play a strong role in that regard?!



Thanks Grazor - given form, Sarota should surely be 'all-but' on the plane to Brazil?! Seems to be our leading DM option now, behind the Milligan-Jedinak combo?

Edited by GloryPerth: 28/4/2014 02:22:38 AM

[youtube]RxI-Rfh9am4[/youtube]
;)

jedi's stats
7 tackles 5 intercepts and 86% passing. If he averaged those passing stats each week he would be the best 6 australia has ever had

To be fair, as regards the % passing, that's not enough information to ascertain how good he is (or whether that puts him in Australia's best ever). Regardless of how much pressure or whether or not they were low/high percentage passes, he has to be congratulated on getting 86% accuracy. But there's 86% passing accuracy and there's 86% passing accuracy. Obviously a player of Iniesta or Xabi Alonso's calibre is going to get a ridiculously high percentage of passing and some of those passes will be considerably more risky and have considerably greater pay-offs.

So, don't get me wrong, I'm not slagging Jedinak off. I was fairly impressed with what I saw in the City game and very impressed with what I saw in the West Ham game. But you do need more information about the nature of the passes before you can canonise him, so to speak.

well I think its his defensive effort which is so impressive. He has the most intercepts per game in europe and 3rd highest tackles per game in the epl. The fact that his passing was decent today makes him a calibre aboveany pkayer we have had I his position. Of course he normally gets 72 per cent

Agreed on his defensive abilities and work-rate. But the fact that his passing was excellent today doesn't, in itself, make him a calibre above any player we have had in that position. Most of his passes were fairly conservative and City weren't looking to strangle Palace in the middle of the park. This meant that the vast, vast majority of Jedinak's passes were extremely high percentage and not overly difficult to make. This isn't a criticism of him, you can only play to the game plan/circumstances. But it means he can't get brownie points for something he didn't do. He wasn't often forced to play the ball around under lots of pressure, nor did he make many highly difficult passes or the kind of manoeuvres (passing and moving at speed) which tend to create lots of space. I think that Bresciano and Culina were of a higher calibre than Jedinak in terms of ball-carrying and distribution (the offensive part of a CDM), possibly Grella was too. But Jedinak is better than Bresciano and Culina in terms of tackles and intercepts, he's probably at least as good as Grella in the 2006 World Cup at it too, and that's very high praise indeed.

was grella the best defender in the seri a before the 06 world cup? Jedi is defending on a level we have never seen before from an aussie

Standard lost so Brugge remain in out-right first place by 2 points! Maty will be playing Champions League if they can hold on. It's in their hands.

Certainly worth sticking around for. How long is his contract?

Till 2016, but they are desperate to hang on to him.

Potentially by the age of 22, Maty could be champion of a top-flight European league playing every minute of every game, be the starting keeper in the World Cup playing against Spain and Holland, and be playing in the Champions League.

Even more remarkable to think that he has just turned 22, which is so young for a goalkeeper.

Hopefully he can continue the trend of players looking towards playing on the continent rather than heading straight for England, Asia or the Middle East. A few blokes who are now starting to kick on over there (Ryan and Kruse are probably the most high profile ones - Oar, Langerak, Halloran, Leckie, Sainsbury are some others doing well over there).

Have been noticeably better over the last month or so.

I didn't get the opportunity to watch much of the Serie A in the time that Grella was there, so I can't answer that question. But, based on reports and second hand knowledge, he probably wasn't as good as a defensive player in the Serie A as Jedinak is a defensive player in the Premier league.

However Grella was judged one of the best defensive players at the 2006 FIFA World Cup. This is enormously high praise and means that one has to qualify the assertion that Jedinak has provided the best defence out of any Australian player ever. Maybe we could say he's the most consistent defensive Australian player ever.

In any event, I still think that while Jedinak is handy going forward, his passing and movement is not of the calibre of the likes of Culina and Bresciano which does indeed create lots of space.

So defensively, one of our best ever. Offensively, handy, but not one of our best ever. This makes it hard to place him among the best handful of Socceroos ever without hesitation.

But the good this is that, going into the future, if we pair Jedinak alongside a quicker, more fluid and highly technical CDM like Sarota (or De Silva, if he can play deeper), we're going to have one hell of an engine room. We'll be very strong in the middle of the park against any Asian nation. And we may be able to give a very good account of ourselves, in that part of the field, against good European and South American nations.

What we really need is strikers who can dominate in 1 vs 1 situations. If we get that, and Rogic comes good, we're in a great position going into the future. Hopefully we can get Reno Piscopo back.

If he gets in the WC squad it would only be out of desperation IMO

Really cant see him making it now, just not enough football over an extended period of time.

Jedinak is not playing in a particularly strong EPL team. The lower teams in the EPL ladder are similar in quality to the better Championship teams. Palace are nothing like the top teams in the EPL. Usually when they play the Manchesters, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, they look like a team from two divisions below.

I'm not convinced that Jedinak is any better than Milligan. The better J League teams are considered by one English football journo, now residing in Japan, to be inferior to the lower EPL teams.

i haven't seen Sarota play for the Socceroos , but Milligan is close to the first Socceroo on the team sheet. Both he and Jedinak have made rapid improvement in the last couple of years and combine well together. As soon as Jedda went off last time, the skipper's armband went to Milligan, so Postecoglou rates him highly.

Jedinak's defensive weakness is lack of mobility and slow recovery if beaten. He used to struggle against nimble Asian teams, being dribbled around a lot, but he has improved. The one area he is our best midfielder, defensively, is in heading. Jedda is in a class of his own there. Nobody comes near him from the last 6 years.

One thing that Milligan does better than Jedda, is that he has started beating players with his first touch, and has started dribbling around players in tight spaces. Other than Holland and Bresciano, maybe McKay on occasions, none of our other DMs have been able to do this. Jedda cannot.

Jedda and Millsy are both good tacklers.

A further aspect is compatibility and fitting into a team. For some reason, Millsy seems to have lifted players around him since playing in the the Socceroos. When he came on, he was the only player to hold his head up, along with Bresc, against Brazil, or France, in those debacles.

Edited by Decentric: 28/4/2014 10:50:21 PM

Edited by Decentric: 28/4/2014 11:51:49 PM

This week's Aussies Abroad looks absolutely atrocious.:cry:

Other than keeper Ryan, Jedda, Holland, Oar, Sarota, Davidson, Vidosic, hardly any player was a starter in a decent league.

If Cahill, Kennedy, Sainsbury, Babalj, Bozanic, are sitting on benches, then few overseas Aussies are doing much better than the HAL. At least DeVere played a full game in the K League.

Not sure if I missed anyone else, but Bundesliga 2 isn't as good as about 12 Euro top divisions.

I just hope fans here are realistic about our chances at the upcoming World Cup.

How can they look like a team two divisions below, what does that make a team two divisions below look? ](*,)

I think Jedinak is a reasonable amount better than Milligan to be honest, his defensive statistics have been quite impressive this year. Though you did mention his weakness of being dribbled, which he does still struggle with a little. He has also been noted as a good leader by both Pulis and Holloway. Milligan, in my opinion, while a slightly superior dribbler and passer, I don't rate his decision making. I also think his defensive capabilities are quite a lot weaker than Jedinak's.

Overall, in a world cup context, I'd start Jedinak over Milligan (I didn't think they looked great together) - playing a full season as captain in an EPL side against far superior quality week in, week out will have prepared him better, even if he wasn't a better player.

Edited by Jon90: 28/4/2014 10:51:57 PM

In terms of possession of teams, technique of individual players, time taken for teams to win the ball back after losing it, chances created on goal, game sense of players , body position of players receiving the ball, ability to play in confined time and space, how teams create chances on goal - where do I stop?

I don't watch Palace play that often, but knowing that Pulis is coaching I have a fair idea of what to expect.

I understood your point, I was just messing you with you because of the way it was worded ;).

You're right though, while Jedinak has done really well this season, it doesn't mean he could play for a better team.

This conversation is plainly ridiculous and can only stem from delusional MVFC fans, or people who are similarly suffering from some form of psychosis in which they believe A-League teams could compete week-in week-out with EPL teams.

Palace would trounce every single team in our league hands-down in a game that meant something.

Jedinak has probably been the best pure defensive midfielder in the EPL this year, definitely in the top 5.

People saying "he isn't the best dribbler, his passing range isn't as good" blah blah... that isn't his fucking job. The way people are talking about Milligan with his "dribbling" ability and better touch etc, you are looking at him as more of an 8 than a 6. That's like comparing Jedi to Yaya instead of Fernandinho/Flamini/Tiote/etc.

Bresciano will be playing the Stevie G/Yaya/Xavi role as deep lying playmaker (if we use one - unlikely as Ange will play Jedi/Millsy).

Jedi is an absolute monster, a captain and leader of a team that will finish in the top half of the EPL table (and carried them to promotion with the help of Zaha), and a player who strikes fear into opposing teams offenses.

Van Persie, Torres, etc will have no fucking idea who Milligan is, but they'll probably think twice before they try and run at Jedinak.

Jedinak>Milligan. End.

Edited by roary's mane: 28/4/2014 11:08:18 PM