Cheers Maxxie, got it working

Good call. 10-0 now.

EDIT: 11-0

Madura United have signed a different defender, Pepper will be remaining with Brisbane. Should be a press release in a few days when said player arrives in Indonesia I'd imagine.

Yeah, surprised it's not more. The side is only from the local Gladstone div 1/2 comp, not even the CQ Premier League squads....

Not a lot to take out of today’s game but here goes:

Consistent style being shown. 
Mauk retains an undisciplined streak.

end of report! 

It's hard to draw any conclusions after that,unfortunately.
The first half was like a training run,with players under very little pressure.
Roar moved the ball quickly with one touch passing and in tight spaces.They took their time to find spaces in the box.
They stuck to their structure.
In the second half the opposition defence was a bit  tighter and more assertive and Roar looked less fluid and took  longer to score.But still scored 4.
O'Shay has fancy footwork ,which works well when defenders layoff him and he looks to have a better radar for goal than ROD atm.He scored 4.
Gillesphey got forward a lot in the first half and looked ok on the ball.
Courtney Perkins has good technique and was able to keep the ball and pass  in tight spaces,playing high on the left.(an interesting pick in what looked to be the A-Team)
Mells looked ok technically and can hit them and score from distance.
Mauk had the most energy and seemed to be everywhere.but like ROD missed a lot of chances.
I don't know if Holloway played,because i didnt hear his name called.But a guy that looked like him was subbed off in the second half.
If that was him.
I struggled  to follow Inman.He did a few good things.But i dont know where he was playing.I presume next to Mells.Mauk seemed to be on the right with someone  in the first half,before McGing came on.It could have been Inman or Holloway.
The backs had very little to do.
No AON or DWH,from what i saw.

Holloway didn’t play today - when he does you can’t miss him as he’s fast and strong, he’s also good enough in the air which would have converted one of the 1,343 corners we had - the week long camp was the main purpose of this week I guess 

My 2 cents

The recruits looked better than the players from last year, first touch was generally better, and passing was weighted better.
This game was more about the structure and the team still dominated, I would like to see how that structure holds up against a strong NPL or a-league side, but if it does the season looks good.
The youth players that Fowler has brought in are looking good hopefully some of them get senior/scholarship contracts.

At least one thing there is structure and a clear desired form of playstyle. Most importantly there seems to be a ruthlessness and professionalism attitude that has been missing from the team.

The ffa cup game is going to be the yard stick.

O'Shea, Inman, Aldred and Courtney-Perkins were the standouts for me.
Mauk is obviously lacking confidence and was getting frustrated with all his missed chances. 
Would have liked to have seen how Amadi-Holloway would have gone, and even DWH.
Gillesphie also look okay.

It is so much harder to judge a team that you do not really recognise on TV rather than live.

You are forced to watch the parts that the camera focuses on and lose so much of the on-field activity.

When it is a team you know and have watched for some time you anticipate some of the actions off the ball so you don't miss it so much. When you have no idea how the team plays too much is lost when you can't see it unfolding.

For a lot of the parts in attack I saw in the second half, I was substituting A-League level opposition to what I was seeing and a lot of our passes and balls won would have gone to the other team.

Despite the score, the half I watched looked a step down from the two previous games - and I think that was largely due to the two previous games increasing in difficulty - but this one dropped back a notch.

I agree with Waz and Crimson - not a lot we can take out of today's game other than more time building understanding within the team and exposure to the new structure.

The FFA cup game is going to be the yard stick - regardless of the score.

First chance for us to see how they play against A-League opposition.
First chance to see how they cope with the expected sustained pressure and quality of attack as well as an organised and effective defence.
First chance to test everything and find what might need oiling.

Genuinely shocked people actually want to keep Pepper.

Our worst ever streak as a club coincides with him being in the team. Hes not been good at any of his previous stops either. I get there are things he is alright at, which some people could cling to over the past two farcical seasons, but there are so many things he is horrendous at that are unforgivable for a 27 year old professional footballer. Hes not 19 and learning on the job. I've been saying it for years; if we are a contending team, he should be nowhere near a matchday squad.

Theres a reason why Sydney/Victory arent going anywhere near him and neither should have we in the first place tbh.

SFC, Glory, Victory all have players of similar quality in their squad. 

Not in a matchday squad.

No. But neither do we. the only reason he got a run last season was all the injuries. 

Broxham?

Could not agree more ...he is sub A-league standard and at 27 always will be ....I also hold this view of Hingert.

I’m more sympathetic to your view on Hingert than I am Pepper. 

Hingert has has been a starter and is on a starters salary of something like $200k - could that money buy a better player? Yes, and we had one in Franjic but Aloisi chose Hingert instead. 

Pepper is not a starter and is not on big money, he’s on something like $80k - with that money could we buy better? No, not a chance, it would just be another name but the same complaints. 

If he is on 80k I hope he has some sort of backup plan . That is not enough to set up for life after football.
I would rather spend  that money on a young player with potential ....but yeah I get that the salary cap means we have to have substandard players so we can have the better ones. That's why I would like to see it either removed or at least raised considerably.
It promotes mediocrity.

Pepper is also a known commodity.

RF could gamble on a good player in the NPL and hope he worked out, but with his handpicked structure he is better off knowing what he has got so he can factor that in.

If I was one goal up against Glory with 15 minutes to go would I feel safe in substituting a forward and telling Pepper not to foul at all but to sit somewhere in front of the DM and make sure Glory have no time to build through the middle? Maybe tag a specific player in midfield to keep them quiet. I think I would.

Keep Pepper out of the box and far enough forward to prevent a critical foul in a dangerous situation and I think he has quality that can be depended on.

Yes this is probably a good point ....but it should not be necessary to have to have some players who need to be kept out of certain areas so they can't stuff up . If the cap was much higher...or non existent we wouldn't be having this conversation and Jacob would be selling Real Estate (or maybe playing in Singapore) .

Agree. The Cap (and financial limitations if there weren’t one) mean we wouldn’t have unlimited funds to fill the reserves with quality so you have to be selective. 

When no no one else seemed to give a shit last season Pepper did seem to care. Apparently this attitude, and that in training, were enough for him to be the only player to be offered a contract. 

We paid iver $600k for Eric last season and less than $100k for Peps, only one gave value for money and it wasn’t Eric imo. 

Yeah, it’s a function of the cap. But take it away and the leagues best players will be squad fillers to Melbourne City while Roar would likely still have the same budget. 

If we get a NSD and that Reserve League we won’t have player problems like Pepper - they’re only like this because they don’t play enough between 19 and their early 20’s ...

Totally agree re Eric ..highly overrated...had some technical talent but tactically was mostly like a chook with his head cut off . ..and yes no cap would not mean endless dollars to spend....  but it would mean we could increase the budget . If the standard of player rises then the standard of play rises. This would be good for everyone ,fans, younger players coming through, club owners and the game as a whole. 

thats a bit of re-writing history.

towards the end of the preseason last year you were saying you expected pepper to be a starter. that was despite devere being fit (and having a bit of a run in early preseason and papa being fit) our CB's at the start of last season were papa, bowles, reardon, pepper, devere. devere was out of favour by the end of preseason, reardon was not going to get an extended run under JA due to his age, so it was Papa, bowles and pepper all of which were going to be in the matchday squad. 

pepper was first choice CB last season from round 1 even though everyone was fit at that stage. pepper is not of the quality to be a fixture in the matchday squad. perth and sydney did not have players of peppers quality regularly in their matchday squads only as fillers on the bench due to injury, let alone as fixtures in their starting squad. 

for example our current first choice RCB was a bench player at Perth last season, and pepper is a (big) step bellow that level. SFC had Calver on the bench who i would put at perhaps pepper and bowles ability level but was only 22 and has much more potential. and still that is a bench player not someone who was a fixture in the starting 11

I believe he is pretty well set up outside of football now, one thing that the FFA/PFA is doing reasonably well (compared to a lot of other places) is prepare player for life outside of football (particularly the ones like pepper who are on low wages but will hang around the league for years)

also there is no doubt that he is a good guy, his attitude on and off the pitch is fantastic, he absolutely enjoys playing football and always has time for kids and fans, but his ability should have him not in the matchday squad. he may be on 80k  but he was first choice CB last season we underspent on that position wildly. an 80k player should be deep depth only coming onto the bench if we have 3 injuries. he was a bloody starter last season and that is criminal

Cap or no cap, players of Pepper’s ability will still Ben playing in the HAL.

The only difference is that the poorer clubs like CCM, Jets, Nix and Roar will have entire squads of players of Pepper’s ability and have little or no chance or recruiting better players.

That promotes mediocrity.

I disagree that if the cap went the Roar would "likely have the same budget"...it may initially but I think the whole league would begin increasing player payments. Yes some clubs would have more to spend and some may not compete at all.  (CCM ?)
However you are also assuming that no club ownership changes .
Under the new independent model the value of individual clubs should increase and I would think there will be far more incentive for investors to put money into the game . This could lead to a few clubs being sold in the next few years or owners part selling and taking on partners .
I see more money coming into the game as a whole and more money will filter down to higher wages etc .
I doubt very much that the cap will stay as it is for too long .

Clubs have not yet explored the full possibilities of expoliting their intellectual property(IP)
Once they own this clubs can go full tilt at merchandising and building their brands.
Getting a marquee player then becomes logical,because they can get the merchandising payoff and income from other activities like endorsements.
FFA's thirst for power under the Lowy regime made it pointless for clubs to invest to build value  in their name,because they ddint own the IP.
The FFA got the money and gave handouts to the clubs.The ultimate socialist system.Now everything is turned on it's head and the clubs can make the money and through the new independent setup ,give the welfare to FFA.