Nikou was a former board member at Victory, so they probably know him well and agree with his vision for the game. Conroy is a massive football fan and has great political connections with the likely new federal government. 

I've heard this quite a bit lately, but I've no reason to think of him as anything other than your typical AFL-zombie VIC pollie.

This is the debate. 

Pommy family, played rep Volleyball, big into Collingwood

Was hoping for something concrete 

well we'll soon find out soon enough as he's the likely new chairman if you believe the rumours. i do think his political connections has to be a positive. 

Formation for Saturday (if still no Ola) ?

Akbari?   Troisi   Honda    Kosta 
       Antonis     Baena
Deng  Georg  Ansel   Roux
               Thomas

Bench:  Hope, Valeri, Ingham, Broxham, Acton

No Toivonen yet, although he is training again. Honda to play as a false 9... 

I noticed its a calf muscle, the classic old man injury, hope it doesn't hinder him too much going forward. We need him desperately!

“Melbourne Victory post a profit of $442,582, on revenue of $22.02 million“

That’s pretty decent.

Profit is always good news, however without the good transfer fees MV received for Milligan, Geria, Berisha and Williams there would not have been any profit. 

But then how much of those  fees then spent on Toivenen and Honda?

Don't forgot Victory would be putting extra money to the accademy now too with that starting to get underway.

It's part of the business model for A-league sides to sell players. Admittedly it was a pretty big year in that regard, but I don't think you can just discount it. End of this year might end up seeing us sell Troisi (hopefully), Antonis, and Deng for decent cash. And I'm sure we can probably sell Milligan again somehow, even if he happens to play in Scotland now.

did lol

pretty sure that has already been fully funded ($10 million from the state government and 11 million from Victory). which is why we opened the chequebook a little more this year to get Honda. 

Not discounting it at all, my point was to actually highlight the importance of developing players and having players performing well to catch the eye of clubs with deeper pockets. In the current climate of football in Australia, international transfer fees are vital for profits to occur. 

Its been  fully funded yes but still need  to pay progress payments and have a contingency  as building anything can blow out . Just look at Tottenham 

Which is something second tier leagues in Europe and South America cottoned on to 40 years ago when the game was beginning to go professional. Clubs like Ajax, Benfica, Porto et al organise their entire clubs around developing and polishing youth and onselling them with a significant mark-up - I'm not saying we need to become a youth only club, far from it. But if the club can get to the point where we're able to on-sell one promising player to Europe or Asia every season, then it'll go a LONG way to ensuring the viability of the club long term. Add in various sell-on clauses so that one in a million that becomes a superstar and sells for megabucks to European clubs, we get a slice.

There is very little money actually within in Australia to sustain professional sport - football is so blessed to have access to international finance on a global scale, whether it be directly owning clubs or simply selling players overseas. Each dollar we receive in a transfer is more money in the local game that wasn't there before.

Toivenen playing this week i believe. 

It sounds like he will get some minutes off the bench. We should win this one comfortably even if he is rested.

which is fine. ease him into it with 30 minutes late in the game.  

Troisi mentioned he had been training alone with Anthony Crea but has been training with the team in the last two sessions. I'd prefer 10 mins max at this stage. Hoping we can really ease him in.

Toivonen wasn't named in the squad so he probably won't play

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

-PB

Victory now undefeated by CCM in well over five years, since the 2012/13 Semi Final under Ange, with our 16 game streak (12 wins, 4 draws) all under Kev.

Surely a head to head club record, and definitely must be a record for a coach against a team.

Josh hope looked  the goods. He has a big future ahead of him. Arkbari  for the minutes he was on showed something.  Wanna see birkim (sp) in the team as well 

I know it was only CCM but Toivonen looked good with the few touches he had. Should fit in very nicely with the rest of the attack.

Hopefully he teaches King Kenny a few things about first touches too

Honda scores last night and is managing Cambodia tonight

Wadda Daimyo

-PB

very impressive talent. my worry with Hope is that he won't get enough gametime with so many midfielders in our squad and will end up elsewhere. he needs to make the most of every chance he gets (like Theoharous last year). obviously scoring will go a long way towards that. 

3-1 win over Laos for Honda's Cambodia, Vietnam and Myanmar's draw has ruled them out for the semis, unfortunately.

Their last group stage game is away to Vietnam but that's the day before Sydney away.