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| Since it appears that people are going up to Wodonga in order to have fun, and since I am, in this case, staunchly anti-fun - if you catch my drift - I'll be giving that trip a miss. I might go and watch the Aces instead, or watch the restoration of Woody Allen's Manhattan at ACMI. |
There was a decent turnout last night, and even a bit of passion for pre-season - the referee being made aware by South fans that they did not agree with what looked like an obvious push in the back by a Hume player.
We looked OK I guess, though who can know for sure? My excuse this time for not knowing what was going on was the two teams conspiring to wear closely matching strips - a navy blue affair for South, a black backed affair for Hume.
No Milos Lujic who is in Bali or something - hopefully he didn't fly with Tiger - but otherwise there was a fair diversity of players used, including new and prospective ones. While our finishing let us down, it was nice to have those chances available.
Reassuringly, our set pieces are still rubbish.
I mention that last fact just in case someone, whether of any particular importance or not, wants to know what's wrong with the team, based in some part on what I remember annoying me the most, or rather perhaps the last thing I remember annoying me.
Next game
Saturday morning (11:00AM) at Hosken Reserve against Pascoe Vale.
Charity Shield news
It will be at Kingston Heath again. Now as for the date, well, the brochure says Thursday February 2nd, but the website says Friday February 2nd. I'm sure they'll sort it out soon enough.
Community TV news
Word on the street seems to be that SMFC TV will no longer be the pay television distributed Aurora community television service. We'll wait for something more solid before writing the eulogy.
Arrivals and departures
Luke Adams has signed up for 2017, as has Leigh Minopoulos. Meanwhile the mystery UK centre back has been settled, with one Carl Piergianni making his pre-season adebut and subsequently being signed, He is most recently of Boston United, which has already made all two of our Boston United fans very happy. Though if it turns out like the last Boston United player we had - Tom Matthews - it may still end up in tears yet.
From the remainder of the 2016 squad, still up in the air (at least nominally) are the fates of Andy Kecojevic and maybe Stephen Hatzikostas as well considering that during the pre-season he has once again been riding his motorcycle trying to catch the sunset or search for the Lost City of Gold or something
As for the rumours of whatever it is Andy Brennan is going to do now that he's been released by Newcastle Jets, I don't have any information on that.
As per last time, the following players are known to be contracted for next season.
- Stephen Hatzikostas (signed until end of 2017)
- Brad Norton (signed until end of 2017)
- Matthew Millar (signed until end of 2017)
- Stefan Zinni (signed until end of 2017)
- Carl Piergianni (signed until the end of 2017)
- Luke Pavlou (signed until end of 2017)
- Ajdin Fetahagic (signed until the end of 2017)
- Joshua Hodes (signed until the end of 2017)
- Luke Adams (signed until the end of 2017)
- Leigh Minopoulos (signed until the end of 2017)
- Liam McCormick (signed until the end of 2017)
- Francesco Stella (signed until the end of 2017)
- Nick Epifano (signed until the end of 2017)
- Kristian Konstantinidis (signed until the end of 2017)
- Tim Mala (signed until the end of 2017)
- Marcus Schroen (signed until the end of 2017)
- Zaim Zeneli (signed until the end of 2017)
- Nikola Roganovic (signed until the end of 2017)
- Michael Eagar (signed until the end of 2017)
- Matthew Foschini (signed until the end of 2018)
- Milos Lujic (signed until end of 2018)
- Jesse Daley (signed until end of 2018)
Players who have left
- Chris Irwin, to Kingston City.
- Iqi Jawadi, to Oakleigh Cannons.
- Amadu Koroma, to Altona Magic
- Mathew Theodore, sabbatical
- Manuel Padilla Herero, loan ended
Would love SMFC TV back on C31. But that platform is on borrowed time as is. Netflix? Stan?
ReplyDeleteBrennan released? The goofball better come back to South if he's heading to the NPLV.
Brennan was released by Jets mid-December 2016 I believe. Considering the size of our squad at this time, as well as his persistent injury problems, I don't see it happening.
DeleteSome big wraps on Carl Piergianni if the commentary from Twitter's Boston United fans is anything to go by.
ReplyDeletePaul, is there any reason why we tend to three 30 minute halves? Is it common practice amongst other NPL clubs?
ReplyDeleteWith pretty much all key members of the Championship squad all signed up, and with the addition of new exciting young players, we could infer that this season's squad is far stronger than last year.
Hopefully we have a strong season and set ourselves up for a decent shot at going back to back.
I think the 3 x 30 minute arrangement has been a fairly common choice in recent years across a number of teams during pre-season.
DeleteWithout knowing the exact reasons why this happens, I imagine it allows coaches more opportunities to switch things around, especially when they have large squads and triallists at hand.