Throughly enjoyed watching us play yesterday. To me we are a different beast at home, and, tbh, it could have been 4-1 or 5-1.

Brown was great, Kristensen is getting better every game, good to see Maclaren score, the defending was high quality against a good side. I'm not sure about Oar on the right, he's very predictable. Borello was great when he came on, perhaps the new super sub? And we still have Dimi and Arana to come in.

Really looking forward to Friday's game against City now. I am confident that if we perform like yesterday on Friday we can win.

A good performance by Roar yesterday.It's hard to work out why we have been so poor before.Although Perth were well below their best.Perth hardly pressed us at all and conceded lots of space.The previous teams we played had all pressed us better than Perth.
But regardless,as the new players start to mesh with system and other players better,we should keep improving.
If only we were more clinical with our finishing.
We only have a four day turn around until the next game against a fresh MC,so this game will be a lot tougher.
Also Hingert and Brown are going to have a torrid time.So we will see if both players have improved defensively.

It was a great Roar performance. Not perfect but they bested a title favourite by some way.

It was a good match, deserved to win. However I am still concerned with the lack of movement in midfield. Hats off to Mackay for being the most mobile and connecting the defence with the mid expertly.

Jury's out for Kristensen. Sure he's improved and can pass the ball well. But lacks mobility and aggression to stop players. Would to have the Brattan mongrel back.

Oar, well seems to do a lot of running with little production. He was one of the two players I thought should have been substituted early. His decision making and shooting is below standard. How the hell did he get recalled for the Socceroos?

Holmin the 2nd I hoped he would get substituted, which he was. Again lacked movement but you can see he's not fit and is letting the midfield down. He will improve with his fitness as long as moves swiftly and becomes sharper otherwise Roar will remain a hot and cold team without the changes.

Credit to Brown. Improvement and more consistent than last season. Fingers crossed and touch wood.

Has Theo saved any decent shots yet?

@ paulc

Don't you think we Roar fans have a tendency to be a bit critical of our own players? Even Bratts when he was here copped it lol. My take on your comments:

- Kristensen for me is starting to run the show and he's making a formidable defensive partnership with DeVere/North and one of the reasons why we've conceded a competition low 8 shots on target

- Theo is hard to criticise but if those 8 shots 6 have gone in. He's not as good a shot stoppper as young.

- Holman has the middle east curse: not match fit from playing over there but at times his play is brilliant.

- are we getting better game by game, I'd say we are (Hets game aside but the coaching staff identified the problem with that apparently)

- brown is benefiting from an improved central defence and he's more aggressive in defence and more assured in attack. I'm loving the ginger Messi so far this season lol

So it's going to be another tough season and the margin between 6th place and the Plate will again be safer thin. But we're in with a good shout I recon 😀

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Holman is not fit,so as someone pointed out ,when he is taking a rest,holes can open up in midfield.Did anyone notice his refusal to play the ball forward,because he was nackered.It was a counterattack and I think McKay passed sideways to Holman ,who basicall ,put up the red flag to say he was stuffed and passed it backwards killing the move.
Oar is getting better.Yesterday he passed the ball a bit more than usual.
I have to say,fans bag players a lot in all teams,but it's clear to me that players need regualar game time to improve.
If you look at players like Warren at Perth.He didn't have a great game yesterday.But was still solid and kept Oar under control most of the time.. He is still streets ahead of where he was at SFC.Where most of us thought he was the worst player in the league.
The players that are always substitutes ,just never get the opportunity to find form and there is a lot of them.
Oar is one who will get better and better ,the more time he gets.He has basically missed over a year of regular football.Last year for Roar he never got regular game time.The same for Brown.
I also believe the poor shooting,from Holman ,Borrello and Oar also comes down to getting match fitness and regular game time.Unfortunately Broich and McKay just will never improve in that department,which probably comes down to shooting technique.

Young would've stopped Marinkovic's shot yesterday. Those are the types of shots he has always helped the Roar with. I recall last season (same scoreline?) he kept the Roar in it.

Theo is starting only due to his reputation.

@ Mr. B

All good points especially in relation to finishing, we must create more and finish more chances.

But I will disagree with you on the Mariners performance, that was a 4-0 performance only Maccers didn't finish several decent chances.

And when you think through the problems Mariners gave Wanderers and Glory away, our defence contained them beautifully and they didn't even get a shot on target. .

The issue for Roar is they're playing their way into the season - they returned to preseason training a month later than other clubs due to the ACL, then they've got a central spine of new players in DeVere, Holman, and Kristensen that are both gaining match fitness and learning how to combine with each other, and Oars having to learn how to play right wing.

Much to improve but plenty to feel optimistic about

I agree. I just don't see how Theo warrants consistent selection over Young. Then again I'm not the coach. But a 75% shooting success rate for the opposition is not good enough.

I am optimistic about this season as Waz has mentioned too. The more the lads play together the more we gel which may stand us in good stead further into the season when we reach peak performance.

Petratos should come in for Oar - retain the same formation/tactics.  Leave Borello to again come off the bench. 

Petratos should come in for Oar - retain the same formation/tactics.  Leave Borello to again come off the bench. 

Holman is playing some killer balls and his control is better than it was 5 years ago (and markedly better than Oar's).  A better signing than I'd expected.
Our best will be competitive but we will need a very good run with injuries if we are to be top 4. If we lose two defenders for any length of time we are cactus. We have Bowles as a sub and then no one.  Very poor recruiting.

At last we have minimised the wasteful tactics of back to the keeper, many times under no pressure. This legacy from Ange's days now attracts immediate charge of the opposition attackers often times forcing our goalie to hoof the hell out of the ball which is only fifty-fifty chance of our boys getting the benefit, that is disregarding the attempts that finish in touch.
Al lin all a vastly improved performance, thnx JA.

Oar will get better.Especially linking with Holman and Hingert.There were good signs btween the three yesterday.Plus all three have the pace and knowhow to rip defences down the right.Plus yesterday I noticed he was getting back in defence and blocked off Castro a few times.In Holland he was very solid in defence.A point often overlooked.
With a full squad,having Petrat ,Borrello and the unkown quantity Arana as substitutes is promising.But will Arana be a Brandan or another My leftfoot?
Does anyone have any feedback on how Arana is shaping up from training?

Yes we are critical because we know the club deserves to be at the top of the tree. That's our expectation. There are problems with the team, more so with the coaching IMO. We looked better against a flat Glory but it was not championship material. Kristensen is improving but is not one that bosses the opposition and playing in their face. Seems to be a poorer version of Carona rather than a Brattan type. Our dfence will be left exposed again to cop a hiding if the defensive mid isn't improved. Mackay can't do it all on his own.

McClaren with the Socceroos .Darrrn....

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Also I did a video of all Brisbane Roars goals last season and will be doing one again this year, already working on it now so will be adding them in as we go. Will post updates on here every now and then for some feedback. 

"Tim has been left out primarily because we have a 10-day lead-in, which is very rare, and I want to be able to put the squad through a lot of work," Postecoglou said.

The squad will begin arriving into Bangkok on Sunday (6th) ahead of the match (15th), which signifies the half-way mark of the Socceroos' final stage on the road to Russia 2018.

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So he should only miss the one match away to ADL, expect to see Borello and Katebian to get some extra min this weekend ? when is the Arana guy available?

Think I read in the paper Arana and Petrotos are available for the match Friday, so maybe the bench but I think Aloisi might wait another week. Aloisi also said that Borello while great he scored off the bench would not be limited to the Henrque role as a super sub, so he could start this week. Katebian with Jmac away should get a bit more game time next week against Adelaide.

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Hey guys, just bought some tickets the Pax is at 20,068.

That's awesome mate, I like how you showed the crowd reaction for the first goal, keep up the good work.

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@ BRITD

Welcome to the Roar cause on-line, all welcome :)

I can never tell what the PAX means re actual attendance but the bigger the number the better.

One of the Roar Ops guys explained some maths to me a while ago - the ticket sales on match day are generally 2x those the day before, so a PAX early yesterday was 19,200 so let's assume 900 tickets were sold yesterday that means 1,800 will be sold today giving a final PAX around 22k then.

But I don't know what that means for the crowd tonight lol. But they are expecting their biggest corporate turnout tonight and a large turnout from the 4,500 stadium members so we're looking good for the biggest regular season crowd since ADP rocked up

Just bought a lot of tics for friends. Pax around 21,630

From experience this will be the minimum crowd if it doesn't look like raining. And it's not. There'll be walk ups.

What a crowd!!!!!!

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