Entries from September 2007 ↓

Prior to the season, we looked at Melbourne’s roster of players and one word came to mind: depth.

Ernie Merrick is a man with options this year. And boy doesn’t he need them?

Five of our players are injured. Two others have been called up for international duty. The team we’ll see lining up against Adelaide United tonight is far from the first-choice squad. Nevertheless, I’m really looking forward to the game.

In Archie’s absence, Leandro Love steps up for his first start of the season. His 25 minutes against the Perth Glory were enough to endear him to Telstra Dome. Given a chance to play a solid game tonight, I wonder if he’ll be able to endear himself to Ernie Merrick. Perhaps his supposed role as “back-up” striker might be worth reconsidering, especially if Danny Allsopp and Archie perform under par.

Besides Leandro, we can also expect to see more of Kaz Patafta, Adrian Caceres and Carlos Hernández. Daniel Vasilevski, Evan Berger and Sebastian Ryall are also along for the trip, each of them hoping to get their A-League début.

Adelaide will also be seeing some changes to the squad, as Bruce Djite and Kristian Sarkies are both of to play for the Under-23s. Nathan Burns is suspended from the Under-23s match, which means he’s still around to make life tough for the Victory. He’ll be joined by former Socceroo Paul Agostino, who was resigned to bench warming for rounds 1 and 2, making way for the Burns and Djite combo up front. Bobby Petta is also an uncertainty for United, after he didn’t complete training yesterday.

To be honest, Adelaide United looks better on paper than Melbourne for this match. The Victory will be missing some of its finest talent. But let’s not forget that this is a Melbourne side still struggling to find its feet. A dramatic shake-up of personnel may not be such a bad thing after all.

My prediction: Adelaide United 1, Melbourne Victory 1

What’s your tip?

Despite being diagnosed with a non-displaced fracture, a break he apparently suffered in the match against Wellington, Muscat is still hopeful of playing against Adelaide this weekend. What measures he would have to take to guard his arm remain to be seen, but he certainly doesn’t seem willing to write himself off as a player. Tough man.

Melbourne’s medical team is being kept busy at the moment with both Joseph Keenan and Milicevic out with injuries as well as question marks hanging over the heads of Pantelidis, Theoklitos and now Muscat. Add to that the two players with international commitments; Thompson and Broxham, and the Victory could be 7 players short this weekend. Obviously not an ideal situation. Whatever the outcome, it now appears certain that we will see a very different team line up this weekend in a match that is always bitterly contested. While it does provide the fringe players an excellent opportunity to stake their claims for a 1st team spot, it is greatly concerning that we should be without so many of the big name players.

Perhaps the only silver lining in this whole situation is that none of the injuries appear to be particularly severe. The recovery times quoted for these players are only measured in weeks, not months.

Steve Pantelidis is one of only seven players who have been with the Melbourne Victory since the inaugural season.

He is a valuable cog in the Melbourne machine and has appeared in 45 matches. Touted by Wikipedia as a central defender, by the Melbourne Victory website as a right back, and by Michael Lynch as a “spare parts man” (The Age), Pantelidis provides Ernie Merrick with a broad spectrum of options.

And yet, this season is off to a rocky start for “Panta”. Early in the Pre-Season Cup, he picked up a hamstring injury. He was back by the time Melbourne played Sydney in the final pre-season hitout, but when it came to the first round of the regular season, Pantelidis was told to stay home. But Merrick insisted that he had not lost his place in the squad:

“He can put others under pressure for a place. He can still get his place back and he’ll get his chance.”

Herald Sun

After the disappointing draw in Wellington, Pantelidis found himself straight back in the first 11 – perhaps owing to Ljubo Milicevic’s injury. But, the poor bloke just can’t seem to catch a break at the moment, coming out of the Perth match with a bad cork that looks likely to set him back even more.

Injury aside, Pantelidis has enough of a challenge to stake his claim in the Victory first 11. His best chance is to slot into the right back role, where his primary competition is Matthew Kemp, who started on the bench in the opening two rounds. Judging by Merrick’s selection for the Perth match, Pantelidis has a slight edge over Kemp. But I expect a fair bit of shuffling around in this spot, especially as injuries force Merrick’s hand somewhat.

Read more about Steve Pantelidis:

• Steve Pantelidis on Wikipedia
• Pantelidis profile on Melbourne Victory website
• Victory turns to Pantelidis, The Age, August 31, 2007.
• Pantelidis to fall as Merrick warns spots up for grabs, Herald Sun, August 24, 2007

Melbourne Victory 0, Perth Glory 0 (our report)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcrAcPLBJjg[/youtube]

Melbourne’s performance tonight was lacklustre at best. It is clear that Melbourne is struggling to get up to speed this season.

Perth, a team coming off of a miserable 0-0 draw against Newcastle last week should have been an easy win for the champions, but it wasn’t to be. Chances were few and far between in a match that provided little cause for excitement. The premature departure of Joe Keenan left Melbourne struggling for ideas in midfield, seemingly unable to string together decent passes and barely able to reach the strikers. There were occasional promising spells, like when Archie lobbed the ball one way over Colosimo and then back the other way before misplacing his shot on goal. Exciting to watch, but not as exciting as a 1-0 score line. Melbourne seems to be slipping into an over-reliance on individual brilliance to generate results. With players like Thompson and Hernandez in less-than-fit states, Melbourne ends up looking uninspiring at best while the rest of the team attempts to grind out a result.

If anything positive was to be taken out of tonight’s match, it was Grant Brebner’s involvement. His early run towards goal after a Hernandez cross was arguably our best chance at taking the lead. Unfortunately his finish wasn’t up-to-scratch and the shot went wide, but at least it indicated that he was looking for runs at goal, something we rarely (if ever?) saw last year. Then, as he lined himself up for a long range strike in the dying moments of the game, it looked like he might be our saviour, just as he was last year against the Glory. The shot had sufficient power, but slightly lacked in direction. Brebner has been given instructions to get forward more and score some goals. Last year’s tally aside, he does have a history of scoring goals, and tonight he seemed fired up to meet the challenge. Unfortunately for him (and us frustrated Melbourne fans), tonight was not the night.

Tonight was also our first good look at Leandro Love. Yes, we saw him briefly in the pre-season, but considering the short amount of time he’d been in the country and considering he was only on for a very short period, it was not enough to draw any conclusions from. Tonight however, he had a respectable 25 minutes or so to impress the crowd. While he did seem a little over-eager at times, he also provided some good movement on the field and in the box. His energy was a little reminiscent of that other Brazilian, Allesandro, but he seems a little more composed and perhaps more comfortable in his role. He managed to get a hold of a few decent chances in fairly tight spots, only to see the shots blocked by defenders. He may not be of the calibre of Archie Thompson, but he certainly does make a decent substitute when we are up against it. Let’s hope he can start finding the back of the net in upcoming games.

Melbourne is certainly up against it in this season of the A-league. Injuries to Milicevic and possibly Joe Keenan, and fitness concerns for Hernandez and Thompson mean we are not going to be the same cohesive unit that we were last season. Unlike last season though, Merrick does have a depth of talent to draw on with the likes of Adrian Caceres not even making it to the bench tonight.

There’s still plenty of reasons to be upbeat about this season. Let’s just hope these draws don’t become a habit.