There is little opportunity for young strikers to develop in Australia. Taggart is the only first choice striker in the A league who’s Australian. With very few teams playing 2 up front these days, if you are the second choice striker, you either get used to warming the bench and playing for 5 minutes, or you end up on a wing.

I agree wholeheartedly, 

It also depends where you look though, there are players in the NPL with first touches better than most A-League players. Lets not forget that the standard of A-League first touches are pretty shit as well, compared to players in Europe and South America. So the AL is no benchmark to be setting.

If anyone watched Kaine Sheppard tonight, his first touches and composure on the field was probably only second to Vargas'. I thought NJ completely lost it when he went off.

On Ken Athiu, he always had a bad touch, his goal scoring record alone got him into the A-League. Plus, he's 2m tall, cut him some slack ;);). 

I agree players like Kitto, Mileusnic, Matty Millar and to an extent Jordan Murray probably got found out more often than not with their first touches this weekend.

The thing with first touches though, is that you either have them, or you don't. People naturally have beautiful first touches, some others don't. It's the same as finishing. Whether you're looking at A-League clubs or NPL clubs those with the ability to have a soft touch, and ability to dribble the ball innately just don't come around often enough as it is. 

DWH will hopefully get a good run next week, to show what he can do. 

@ Ds98

My junior club is forming 2-3 teams for next season, U18s, and we’ve been holding trials over the last 8 weeks ahead of a January tournament and then the season.

Because of the huge drop out rate from U16 to open we’re merging players from teams that have been through SAP and those that haven’t.

The kids through SAP have got a way better first touch than those that haven’t. But interestingly through the trial matches they’re not necessarily the best footballers despite playing at a higher standard and getting better coaching than non SAP kids.

Who would you play on a weekend in that case Waz? the kid with a mint first touch or the kid who reads the play and is actually good at football?

@ Ds98

I’d always pick the best footballers. Sometimes they have the touch and all the rest; sometimes they don’t have that first touch but they get the game and their place in it.

It’s interesting how the coaches involved go about their assessments though, plenty of chopping and changing of minds.

A slight aside but related to this discussion perhaps is we’re getting plenty of attackers trialling but they can all play across the front, they’re equally as good as wingers as they are attackers. But only one player that can only play striker.

So after a decade of coaching we’ve only got one “out and out” striker which seems familiar

Yes. I've always found natural, shall we say, strikers the hardest to find.

Everyone reckons they can play there but very very few actually do well enough.

I think part of it is not only being able to reliably finish chances, but to anticipate the play better than most. Some players just "get it" .

AS a tall skinny player myself i completely sympathise with King Kenny. it is very very hard to look graceful with those proportions.

However i think of all the things that make up a good footballer first touch is by far the easiest thing to learn (well at least improve to a point where you dont get found out). Some people will have a touch like messi naturally and no matter how much you practice some people wont get to that standard but it is the easiest thing to repeat over and over and over to get into muscle memory. you dont need anyone else just time and a brick wall, you dont need to do it in a game as you can simulate by looking over your shoulder while taking the touch, it is all about getting it ingrained and i think that because it is such a simple skill that doesnt get punished at the lower levels it is overlooked so players get lazy. 

As i said i am a huge fan of DWH so hopefully he can improve. I am so disappointed with this season, so much promise and we have let ourselves down, some of the time it as been JA, some of the time it has been individual players, some times it has been the team as a whole. this week it was eric, taggs and partly the ref. 

Taggs should have buried the chance in the first minute which would have settled the whole team, eric should not have flown in like a mad man and then got involved after, the ref got conned giving the second yellow, should not have allowed the earlier challenge on eric to go unpunished, and needs to read the laws of the game regarding handball. 

one final note on the ref in the penalty to us, how does thomas get away with missing the ball completely and punching a player in the head, then how does Honda get away unpunished for giving the pen away, not a genuine attempt to play the ball, and is denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity so should be sent off, it is as simple as that. you saw it in the sydney derby,  janjetovics handball outside the box denys an obvious goal scoring opp and is sent.   

Sirhcdobo......
You make very good points, and the points regarding the referring are ones I was wondering too.

Also Eric gets a second yellow but Toivinen and Troisi manhandled Eric to inflame the situation and as I recall neither are carded. Both players were attempting to goad Eric. As I understand it retaliation is a yellow card.

So what is going on with this referee.

He is not up to it in my opinion.

What has happened to Yeboah? Heard little of him.

He’s playing third division German football. Fortuna Köln

The ref had a poor game - not doubt about it.
However he made just as many (I would say more) bad calls against MV as he did against Roar.
Arguing about the second yellow is a weird as it should have been a straight red.
The handball had to be given as his arm is making his body wider and moves to the ball. He had enough time to get it out of the way.
The roar goal came because the ref missed 3 fouls to MV leading up to the goal.

Let just say the ref was poor for both teams and not blame him for Roar losing. Eric is the only one who deserves that honor.

Two weeks tomorrow it’s January and the transfer windows start opening up around the world

Assuming there’s no movement out of Roar the only option is a replacement for Holman which could be a marquee and visa player.

Right wing and AM are probably the area we need to focus on (although it would be nice to sign a competent defender)

Any names come to mind??

Jordy Buijs
Mitch Duke (likely to sign for Sydney I reckon)
Luke Brattan (if released)

Over it.

After such a promising off season with great signings, new training facility, great membership numbers, kit reveal etc, this season has already fallen to shit. A great squad on paper showing no pride or care for the clubs badge has been proven over and over in their performances and drive to be successful. The general Match Day entertainment and atmosphere around the stadium is shite, you look around at the people sitting around you and half the people are more interested in their phones and the conversation they are having with those next to them. The Den needs change, should go back to English style support IMO (no capos/ stand) Listening to the capo start the same song over and over with not many following suit is just boring and a tad cringe. 

Rant could go on forever but i'll stop here. 

@ IKnowBest

I agree with most of what you say about the ref, noting that one of the MV goals also came off the back of what looked like Broxham going through maybe Captain Matty's ankles to dispossess him right up the the end. I expected VAR to consider that moment since it was directly related to the continuing movement to score, but I have seen and heard nothing to suggest that they looked that far back at all,

My question to anyone who knows better than me is about the handball call, where you say "The handball had to be given as his arm is making his body wider and moves to the ball. He had enough time to get it out of the way". His arm was behind his body in what could reasonably be considered a natural position for his movement. It looks to me like the only movement he could have made (had he had time to move his arm which I doubt) to avoid the contact would have meant bringing his arm round to the side - which would have actually been moving his arm towards the ball. I thought it was a play-on situation and (to my orange eyes) a clear ball to hand. Had he moved his arm towards his side (and the ball) and still made contact that would have most likely been construed as a deliberate handball.

Also, do you actually have a requirement to move your arm away if it is in a natural position and the ball is coming to your arm as fast as that one was? I would argue not or it would be easier to shoot at a running player's arm than at goals when it gets crowded than to take a dive like many attackers do.

@jackson10. I hear you. Though I like the song, it is not a household favourite among the mainstream public and the lyrics/tune are not easy. Result = 3 people singing. If you must have a fan song, pick one that the mainstream crowd knows, or at least one that is easy and where the chorus is more than 10% of the song..

And the half time entertainment has reached a new low with crowd karaoke. Just let the little kids play their 5 a side and do away with the rest of the circus.

@ Jacksone10

I would rather they continue with their best cringeworthy efforts than not given their enthusiasm and genuine support of the team. I think the team appreciates their efforts too when the rest of us in the stands run out of things to scream and it would be so quiet otherwise.

On the cringe side, I would go further though and say be more cringeworthy.What bette rway to get up the opposition fans noses than belting out classics like "You Roar me up, so I can stand on mountains. You Roar me up, to walk on stormy seas". They would probably get more people joining in given the real words are already well known and easy to follow.

Cringe away Den!

Maybe change the content a bit more throughout the season and add more targeted chants for specific players when they do something good like you used to - harder when we don't have a stable playing side from week to week - and I acknowledge how much work that would be.

@ Roar in my Blood

The handball rule is very simple: it has to be deliberate to be handball.

The rule also makes allowance if the distance travelled is short ie the offending player couldn’t possibly react. That doesn’t apply in Bowles case though.

The position of the hand/arm is irrelevant even if it’s in an “unnatural position” but refs will consider that in an attempt to determine intent as well as if the arm is moving “towards the ball”

Only Bowles knows if he meant to do it and that’s the problem with the law - referees can’t read minds so it becomes a matter of opinion, and in his on Friday it was deliberate therefore penalty.

IFAB are looking at tightening this rule up a bit and will probably use something like “did the offender gain a material advantage” to decide - something I think they’re doing already albeit unofficially

For me it’s a penalty. I’d hate not to be awarded that if it were reversed.

On the general topic of referees, it was noticeable what a better game we had with the Japanese ref. I used to defend our refs but I’ve given up, they’re serving up some naff stuff lately and VAR has made it worse for them.

Thanks Waz

Edit: Just watched some highlights of the game *again) and saw that a lot of players running in traffic have their 'trailing arm' in the same position as Bowles did when the ball hit him. More specifically, and to invite comments about the gunman on the grassy knoll, when Barbarousis scores his goal around 12 minutes, Bowles is running alongside him and has his trailing arm as near as exactly the same position as it was when he was hit by the ball later in the game - and in this case the ball is already going into the net so it is obviously his natural loping style.

I can understand the penalty call going against us - but with the miracle of hindsight and VAR I would have been happier with the opposite result for all that I would have no doubt screamed blue murder if the roles were reversed.

Nothing to see here - move along - but for my personal view I am confident it was just natural body movement this time and not intent by Bowles.

Appreciate you clarifying the handball rule for me regardless of differing application. Glad I'm neither ref nor VAR on these ones.

Centre back Georgios Koutrombis aged 27 is free agent and Greek. 2 Greek centre backs would be interesting. Spent recent years at AEK and Panathinikos and Standard Liege.

Could he above the available finances though.

Robert Huth, free agent, getting on a bit tho.

Flamini still free also. He's 34.

@ Roar in me Blood

I’ve got a lot of sympathy for Bowles there, he couldn’t step out of the way and let young deal with it nor could he risk deflecting it and giving young no chance of making a save. So he had to try and get in the way and block it someone just sadly for us it was his arm.

There was an early home game last year where we didn’t get a penalty in slightly similar circumstances (I think it was Adelaide?) where a cross heading towards goal/Maccarone was handled but the ref/VAR played on.

All this stuff feeds Aloisi’s growing paranoia around refs and his perceived lack of luck. Something that is not helpful

So the question is. If that’s considered a deliberate handball in the box, why no card? It would have been his second and we would have been down to 9 men.
What are the fine lines these days between a yellow, a straight red or nothing at all for handball?

The Roar need to find a good centre back to partner Avram.  I hear a good CB called Luke Devere may be available in the January window, maybe the Roar should contact his club to see if he is available.   

Also, maybe time to move TK to the bench and get some youth in there next to Lopez.

@ clockwork

I think the simple answer to that is “common sense”.

The referee didn’t need to award a card as a penalty is punishment enough. Something I think he could have done in Bautheac a case but decided not to

....the fact that even Roar supporters are divided as to whether it was a penalty shows that it is a 50/50  decision.
I have looked at it a few times now and changed my mind three times .
I now think he should have been given the benefit of the doubt . A 50/50 penalty should be waived play on in my eyes...but I have no issue with this one being given either ..it could have gone either way....intent was not clear.

Lets face it ..we were never going to win that game anyway and if we had it would have simply shored up JA's position in his eyes.
I hate to say it ....but I am now sort of hoping we do badly to force some sort of major change. (yes ...that may make me a bad supporter but hey I support Man Utd as well....not having a good year football wise...I need to see change ! lol )
I can not see anything improving long term as it stands.
We need to either sack JA and Ross or, at the very least, sack Ross and get JA a tactically astute and wiser assistant ....i.e someone like Ron Smith or even Rado.
(A defensive coach would be good too ).
Edit ...it must be JA who sacks Ross though as he must buy into the need for different advice and be willing to listen to it.....trouble is I can't see this happening ...do Italians sack brothers ?

@ Miron

Fair comments. My main worry is that JA and the team focus on “the injustice” of things like the send off and the penalty - they’re almost looking beaten before they start lately and certainly once they go behind.

Do brothers fire brothers? No, Italian or otherwise, but if Ross was smart he’d resign and give JA a chance via some form of change. However I suspect they’re both locked into the “we’re unlucky” narrative 😞

It appears to me as well the players have lost faith in coaches.

And in senior football that's a downhill slide.

We are all on same page, Ross must go. If not both must go. I've called for it weeks ago, at least with Ross. His behaviour is poor.

Someone in the boardroom must have the guts to initiate this process.

Get to it boys, asap. You are losing your supporters.

And without them......you have zero.

There was a moment in the game on Friday when the cameras focused on the Aloisi's and Ross was just staring into space, not even looking at the pitch. John was very downcast. I thought that was very indicative of where they are, and hence where the team is. Time to separate them, and give John a chance. It seems Ross isn't going to fall on his sword.

I look at it this way - if Eric's and Bowles' fouls had been committed against us, I would have expected a straight red and a penalty.

Has there ever been a pen or a red given against Brisbane that Aloisi hasn't complained about?  He's definitely taken Arnie's mantle as the league's biggest whinger.