The New Normal - Heidelberg United 0 South Melbourne 1

A healthy crowd in a compact ground. It all felt
a bit country footy. Photo: Luke Radziminksi.

I know I said that I was unlikely to go to Jack Edwards Reserve, in the event that there was a lack of a plan with regards to ticketing and crowd capacity. And yet, though there was no plan publicised, I ended up at the ground anyway. 

You'll say that of course that I was always going to turn up, but what turned it for me was the Dandenong derby on the Friday night, where a large crowd was in attendance all around the ground, and who knows what if any advice was given to spectators beforehand. Later on I heard they may have begun to turn people away from George Andrews Reserve, but that's more or less hearsay to me, much in the same way that the rumour started that the grandstand at Olympic Village had been condemned. 

More likely in the latter case, it was actually the old media and VIP shed on the western side of the ground that's been deemed even more unsafe than the rest of the venue. That would make sense; after all, if the eastern stand was really that dangerous, why were there spectators and a film crew allowed in there to watch the under 19s and 21s fixtures? But I digress.

Out here in Sunshine, it's rail replacement services up and down the Sunbury line at the moment, which makes getting out to places like Oakleigh that little bit more bothersome. Still, one of the minor perks of covid is that there's fewer people using public transport, so everything went smoothly enough on that front. Caught up with Gains at Flinders Street (but not before trying to jog my memory about which line Huntingdale station is on), then we took another petri dish out to Oakleigh, and soon we were at the ground.

Once at the gate, I saw the first evidence of a covid plan of some sort. Usually my media pass is enough to get me into a ground without too much hassle, but on Sunday there was a QR code on the ticket booth to scan and fill in details for. Good for pleb members of the crowd, albeit it'd be nice if there was some forewarning in case the majority Greek crowd turned up five minutes before kickoff as per custom, and then had to fiddle with phones and digital forms to get in.

Which is another way of saying, considering that as part of my media pass a lication I already had to supply contact detail information, couldn't they just let me into the venue after taking down my pass number? But after no soccer for a year, one doesn't want to complain too much, because the experience on that front went fine enough. I do wonder though whether it will mirror the procedure for entering Lakeside this Friday and the weeks to come. Might be a good idea to put out a note in the socials in the leadup to the game. Maybe.

Once in the ground, everything just seemed mellow. Warm, sunny day, some people I saw last week or the week before, and a whole bunch of people I hadn't seen for about a year. There was also a distinct lack of emotional angst. Maybe everyone's a bit rusty and the angst and anger will come back, or maybe the time off has seen everyone grow a bit older in ways other than just the chronological. 

Maybe most of our diehards have realised, finally, that the war is indeed over, and that we should enjoy the time we have left with this club, whether that be two years, ten years, or somehow more. Sure, there's still going to be people who haven't got the message yet that we've surrendered, and thus they'll keep fighting in Twitter's Filipino jungles for a couple more decades; but most people just seemed glad to be back. How many people that were there on Sunday will once again become regulars - outside of a game against old rivals, and for many at least, at venues within short distance of home - remains to be seen.

Without being at all scientific about it, the consensus may well be that people are getting tired of fighting, or at least tired of fighting the forever war that was South Melbourne 2005-2020. Some of them are probably also tired of fighting with people at home to go South games, instead of family functions and sundry responsibilities. I reckon it's been a long time since a South game would've fallen under the category of a family outing as it was in the past. As usual though, I worry that when I make these kinds of observations, I am actually just extrapolating my own feelings onto the wider South Melbourne Hellas community who may have already reached that stage of emotional resignation years before I caught up to what might now be an ancient zeitgeist.

The mellow vibe extended to the surrounds. Middle Park was a classic suburban venue, Olympic Village much the same, and Lakeside a step or two up from either of those while still inhabiting that conceptual space. But Jack Edwards is more truly suburban, and no amount of new electronic scoreboards can change that feeling. Important things happened at the other grounds mentioned - and while it's not like there haven't been important games here, too - it's not really even remotely the same thing.

Instead of being partisan, the atmosphere was closer to that of a large community picnic. I reckon also that were there were considerably more South fans or sympathisers there than Berger fans. That's unusual in that the numbers have been more even over the past few years. Maybe being in more South friendly territory in the south-eastern suburbs, and the fact that the nominal home team support couldn't rally around the Snake Charmer (who was apparently banned from playing his clarinet) distorted that perception.

I don't know how many people were in attendance. The stand wasn't full, but maybe there were restrictions on how many could sit there - or maybe people didn't feel comfortable staring into the setting sun. Around the rest of the ground there was a solid amount of people without anyone feeling that their personal space and enjoyment of the game would be impeded. Is this the kind of crowd that people would envisage as being suitable for a second division, in both numbers and style? I don't know the answer to that question either.

The game itself - and there was a game in the middle of my musings on mellowness - was exciting, and occasionally of a certain quality, though the latter had more to do with Heidelberg's Japanese signing from New South Wales than anything we were able to put together for much of the game. 

Just about everyone's said it, and so there's no harm in me saying it as well: South's performance in the first half was rusty at best, and several unmentionable adjectives at worst. Only Heidelberg's profligate finishing kept us in the game at the break. To be fair, while we were cut up in midfield and allowed the Bergers to get into the box far too easily, I was at least pleased to see that instead of panicky defense, we decided to rugby union our way out of trouble more often than not, rather than pussy-foot around the back.

One thing I forgot to mention from last week's report from the St Albans friendly was how much it seemed that Esteban Quintas wanted the team to play out from the back. It didn't really work then, and while we set up in vintage Nunawading style from goal kicks a couple of times, I think someone figured out early enough (maybe due to the narrow ground, or maybe due to Pierce Clark's poor distribution by foot) that it wasn't going to work on Sunday and put an end to it. 

Even when we muscled our way back into the game after a shaky start - and apart from the three points, the welcome bullying physicality of Josh Wallen and Marco Jankovic seemed to be the main takeaway for a lot of people - going forward there were clear issues. Maintaining possession in midfield seemed difficult, especially when expecting Gerrie "he's only a little kid" Sylaidos to shoulder a lot of that burden. Henry Hore, who by all reports appeared lively during pre-season, was not quite as effective in this game.

What's more, it didn't really make any difference on whether a player had played something closer to a full season last year (say, in Queensland) or not (pretty much everyone else). Some people played better than others, and there was no real method to it other than the people I generally expected to play well did so, and those that I have longstanding doubts about, didn't.

It's funny though how sometimes dumb luck smiles upon you, and shows you what you may be good at. For us, that aforementioned physicality and the height that comes with it, might well be the thing that carries us to at least mid-table mediocrity in 2021. Six years ago at the same venue, Tim Mala put in the best cross of his life to find Nick Epifano at the back post, who controlled well and snuck the ball in past the goalkeeper. 

On Sunday, at the same end of the ground, Josh Wallen lumped a mess of a cross into the box, which fell onto the head of the very tall Harry Sawyer, who had front position in front of the very short Heidelberg keeper trying to reach the ball; after hitting Sawyer's head, shoulders, and back, the ball proceeded to fall over the goal line before the Berger defenders could clear it away.

The well-worn truism remains the same as it ever was - they all count the same. But a bit more polish and method wouldn't go astray.

Now the state leagues, mercifully, don't have VAR. And even if they did have VAR, you'd hope they wouldn't have overturned this goal. Still, goalkeepers being protected species, regardless of whether VAR exists or not, I don't think anyone was expecting the otherwise perfectly legitimate goal to stand. In that respect, the celebrations were muted as if there was VAR involved. 

Anyway, having gone ahead, we may have learned something about this team: that it looks better with a lead than without one. With the game in the balance, we looked more vulnerable than our opposition. With the lead, and with the opposition committing more numbers forward to get the goal back, we were able to break forward a few times on the counter-attack. That we were unable to add to our single goal was disappointing, as was the late fade out which saw the otherwise tired Bergers find a second wind, but we held on and won the game; our first win in round 1 since 2016.

Neither team was at its fittest. That's round 1 for you, and it's especially evidence of how much lockdown interrupted pre-season has stalled preparations. We were a bit fitter, a bit stronger, and a bit luckier. Sometimes that's enough. It's not a win that solved any of our on-field problems, but it did help expose them a bit more and hopefully gets the coaching staff thinking about more tenable solutions. Pierce Clark had a good game in terms of shot stopping, but a messy game in other facets. We have a lot of defenders to choose from, and not all of them can play in the same team. Apart from Brad Norton, our back four was tall, heavy, and somewhat flatfooted against speedy smaller players.

Having Luke Adams at right fullback also meant limited opportunities for overlapping runs. At one point in the second half Daniel Clark played a ball into the corner, expecting a run from Adams, but the run never came. And yet despite the disappointment contained in that sequence, I also get why Adams wasn't there - if the pass went awry in some fashion, all of a sudden there'd be no-one behind Adams to close down the channel on that right wing.

Attacking wise we have some talent which misfired a bit, especially when trying to work together. Much of the plan going forward became long diagonal balls to backtracking opponents, and hoping to win the second ball crumbs. That tactic worked a bit more than I expected, but I wouldn't expect that to work so much against the better teams. And the tactic also has the whiff of George Cross rugby tactics circa the mid 2000s that gives me the heebie-jeebies, if for no other reason than the fact that George Cross are several divisions below us for reasons like a reliance on that tactic.

At the end of the game, the celebrations were politely raucous, and contrary to one interpretation of a post-match photo of yours truly, I was content with the result, if not exactly the method used to reach that point. And then I had to find someone I'd promised to loan two portable blank hard drives. Then I saw my FNR colleague and NPL commentator Josh Parish, and asked him if he was able to work any of the insights I gave him into the game. Then I saw Ben Coonan, producer of the little Football Belongs ethnic vignettes. And then I went home.

Next week

Eastern Lions at home on Friday night. Lions are once again everyone's pick to get relegated, but that doesn't mean they should be taken lightly. I mean, they pushed hard against us last year

Optus Sport Football Belongs podcast

The other week I was on a podcast with Roy Hay, John Didulica, and David Davutovic, discussing the 1964 Slavia vs VFL XI match at Olympic Park, as well as other digressions.

Match programs

Greg Stock has been scanning and uploading Canberra City and Cosmos match programs, and sending the South related stuff our way. His efforts have filled in three or four gaps, including one where I didn't expect a program to exist - a 1980 pre-season friendly. 

On the streams

A half here, a half there, and bits of pieces everywhere else.

For better or worse, I'm going to be experiencing more NPL action via the streams than in person than I used to. I suppose that we should be reassured that this service is still going, though I'm not convinced that they need to do the under 21s matches. Then again, I'm not convinced that the under 21s need to exist, because I'm not sure any player reaching that age should be doing anything other than playing regular senior football. Still, while the service exists, we home viewers might as well as make use of it, much as the commentators and film crews make use of the experience gained. Friday night, I saw the first half of Port vs Knights, where the latter looked like they had a plan for the first time in a few years, while the former looked trapped by the way they'd been instructed to play. The second half of Thunder vs City was more competitive, but apart from playing spot the ex-South player, I saw nothing that would indicate a title threat. I watched the first 15 minutes or so of Eastern Lions vs Bulleen, enough to learn that Bentleigh will be fine, and Lions probably won't be. By the standard of Friday night's games, the first half of Avondale vs Oakleigh, and the bits I skimmed later on, were a revelation: fast-paced, competent, flexible, and hard football from both teams - and mistakes were punished with prejudice. The second half of Hume vs Altona Magic also had too good teams, albeit with less fluency.

Final thought

It was good to be back. There's no comparison to seeing a game in the flesh.

Venue and kickoff time change for this week's match - UPDATED

What was rumoured to be the case earlier in the week, has now been confirmed as fact - although a few details remain undetermined. 

The Heidelberg United vs South Melbourne match for this Sunday has been moved from Olympic Village, to Jack Edwards Reserve in Oakleigh.

The kickoff time has also been pushed back from 5:00pm, to 6:00pm.

There will be no curtain raiser match - these are still being played at Olympic Village.

There has been no information released yet as far as I'm aware about what the crowd capacity will be limited to. There is also no information yet on whether there will be pre-sold tickets.

While the situation could develop quickly, at this stage I am not recommending heading to this game, until such time as matters relating to capacity and ticketing are resolved.

UPDATE 27/02/2021

In lieu of any official guidance from Heidelberg and Football Victoria in regards to a crowd cap and ticketing arrangements, I was very much leaning to not attending this game. 

However, after watching last night's games on YouTube, especially the Dandenong derby, my opinion has changed insofar as no one seems to want to take any responsibility for how games are organised on the covid safety front, 

So my advice now is, if you're going to go, do what I plan to do, and get there early enough so that in the event that they do reach a point where someone decised there are enough people there, you'll be in Jack Edwards Petri Dish Stadium rather than outside of it.

The Dockerty Cup as unloved middle child - South Melbourne 0 Bentleigh Greens 2

It needn't have ended up like this, but the way things were set in motion, what happened last night was the most likely outcome. That no one seems too bothered by the result seems to me on one level to be problematic - after all, don't we at South Melbourne go in to win everything? - but at the same time, this being the year of unstoppable good feeling at Lakeside, most people seem happy to go with the flow.

That, and the Dockerty Cup doesn't seem to be the hill that anyone wants to die on. In that sense, the Dockerty Cup is the forlorn middle child grasping for attention against mature and serious big brother League Ambition, and spoiled and petulant little brother FFA Bandwagon Cup.

The match was against Bentleigh, the team that presently more than any other causes us unending grief. The match was at Jack Edwards Reserve, a venue at which we have only won once in the last few seasons, and even that was more due to a chaotic late flurry in a rubbish game than dare I say it, skill or planning. The match was also in the middle of June instead of at the pointy end of the season, the latter of which we are far more predisposed to doing well in, as long as you ignore our 14 or 15 match unbeaten streak, and a potted history of disastrous results during several recent pointy ends

There was also once again no Milos Lujic, and also no Nick Epifano, so I think you could quite clearly see where our priorities were set - namely, getting in and out of this affair primarily without injury or suspension. And if things should just happen to pan out a particular way, end up having Lakeside host the final as the neutral venue of choice, where we may make some decent coin at the bar and kitchen. All in all, a case of win-win being not so much different from lose-win.

David Barca Moreno was put up front, by himself, and it did not work. This was mostly due to the fact that, apart from the first twenty or so minutes, we played the ball to him as if he was Milos Lujic; that is, long balls that he was asked to chase and compete for against centre backs. Now Moreno may be a gifted player or he may be a plodder, but I don't think he is that particular kind of forward; rather, I think he is one of those types that prefers the ball to feet, and for the most part we didn't do that.

But that opening twenty minutes! My word, didn't we look almost-sorta-competent-but-not-really during that time! Well, yes; yes, we did. As much or opponents were taking the ball up one end with a certain amount of confidence, so were we. In what was an open game marred by petty officiating - which we copped the brunt of of, though on reflection most of that fairly - both sides sought to outdo each other for bad crosses and midfield turnovers.

They didn't make us force a save during the first half that I can remember, while we had some OK chances, but this game soon went where so many recent contests against the Greens have gone - we forfeited any pretense at controlling the midfield, and eventually let Bentleigh have the match played on their terms. Our wide play, or the narrower confines of Jack Edwards Reserve, was limp at best. Neither Leigh Minopoulos, the returning Jesse Daley, nor Marcus Schroen had any meaningful impact on the contest.

Matthew Millar trudged up and down the field, but ineffectually. Maybe the bright sparks in the crowd are on to something when they say that he struggles at this ground, but I want more evidence first; two times only being a coincidence and not a trend as is three times. Luke Pavlou was industrious (ugh, bad word for 'tried hard but didn't do good') but also got lost a lot of times.

Further back, Brad Norton slipped and fell and looked shakier than I've noticed for a while. Matthew Foschini tended to have the measure of his direct opponent at right back, and even made some promising runs forward, but was let down by his crossing - which to be fair, was pretty much the sa,e deal as any other South player that attempted a cross last night.

The best on ground for us was Michael Eagar, who continues to play like a man reborn in 2017. Stefan Zinni was brought on probably a bit late for my liking, but once on had negligible impact on the contest. I'd also like to note that, while it's not like we weren't competing, we did look perhaps a little reticent in going full-blooded into the contest, maybe even a bit tired.

Once we fell behind in the second half, as we deserved to do, I guess the writing was more on the wall than ever. Did we improve once we conceded? Not really. Did anyone get particularly upset when Tyson Holmes doubled Bentleigh's lead thanks in no small part to Tom Rogic (video blocked to due FIFA chucking a tanty)-esque outrageous piece of good fortune? Not that I could tell. The team lifted a little bit, played with a bit more urgency, but not much more skill, and thus we bowed out of the Dockerty Cup running.

I am the bag of sand that puts out the party flame
I really would have liked to have won this game, seeing as how I fought for the return of the Dockerty Cup name and trophy, and to a lesser extent because I like it when South wins things. But everyone else around me, and even those on the forum, seemed not so fussed.

On the terrace last night then, perhaps because of the fatigue of winning too much or because of a general apathy towards this tournament, the atmosphere in Clarendon was at its most convivial, witty and oddball. Chants started off strong, before withering off into nonsense noises; more deconstructionist sound art project than chant, like the time we did staccato renditions of the 'vamos a la playa' chant back in 2008.

After hoping that the whole Matthew 'Apples' Millar thing (Millar being close enough in pronunciation to the Greek for 'apples') would die a sad and lonely death, last night we reached peak 'Apples' season when two inflatable red apples made an appearance. Goodness knows what Millar himself makes of this; provided he pays any sort of attention to this nonsense. Suffice to say, I did not join in the 'apples' chant, nor did I playfully bounce the inflatable apples around.

For some reason - maybe because he had a particular moment of bad play early on, or perhaps because as a collective we've gone through hating every other Bentleigh player these past few seasons - Nick Glavan came in for some attention this time. Either way, the erratic booing and cheering of Glavan - referred to only as 'Number 19' because I don't think most people knew he was - became an essential feature of the first half as he trod up and down the wing in front of Clarendon Corner.

Had it been up to me, some mention would have been made of Glavan's traitorous move from Knights to Bentleigh being part of the reason the former are in the dire straits they are, but that would have killed the entire whimsical notion of him being some random that people had decided to focus their attention on. That, and it was kind of sad when it did look like Glavan's Greens teammates were deliberately not passing the ball to him. For his part Glavan took the unusual attention directed toward him in his stride.

The crowds at state league soccer, as they were for much of the NSL, are of a such nature that fans and players can find themselves building a rapport even over the course of just 45 minutes. Since in our case this often ends badly, I'm just glad that for once we managed to get out of both Jack Edwards Reserve and a match against Bentleigh without any unpleasant scenes.

I still rather we'd won though.

Next game
Oakleigh at home on Sunday. Very short turnaround. Mid-season slump time?

Fixture updates
We have a rescheduled date for our postponed round 16 home against Avondale. It's been scheduled for Wednesday August 2nd.

This is the last time I'll mention this, for the next few months at least 
Some or many of you may be aware of SBS having sold off their a good deal of their world cup rights to Optus, in exchange for one game a week of EPL rights. This has upset some people, me included, but I've not made a big deal about it under I lost my cool on Twitter the other day.

This decision means that rather than showing the whole tournament, SBS will only shows 25 matches live (others on delay), while Optus gets 39 exclusive matches. For SBS, that will be one live per day (their pick), four round of 16 matches, two quarter-finals, both semi-finals, and the final. For free-to-air views, everything else will probably be on delay.

Because SBS has decided it would rather have access to Bournemouth vs Palace, what was the best free-to-air coverage of the World Cup in the world is now gone. For folks of a younger vintage, who have grown up accustomed to watching sports on subscription television, this won't seem like bad a deal. For those of us who grew up with this service as a given, the compromise seems nonsensical.

While it was the best free-to-air coverage of the tournament in the world, Australians still had to work for it in order to watch. Along with the mainstream media's ignorance of the tournament's magnitude, the ridiculous late night and early morning sessions, always in the middle of winter, made the tournament accessibility an inherent issue.

But that's where SBS stepped in, the self-appointed broadcast media guardians of soccer in Australia. They brought us the tournament in its entirety, and gave it the respect it deserved - give or take Craig Foster's inability to comport himself professionally during Socceroo matches. But no more, because SBS prefers to live off the drip feed benefits of Anglophile and Eurosnob magic beans. SBS once boasted about its soccer coverage, of which the World Cup was the the undoubted jewel in the crown.

I have had one Twitterer say that I should just pay for the Optus package. After all, I must have a 'home phone, mobile phone or broadband'. Well, yes, I have all three of those products with one company or another, and I can easily afford whatever Optus would charge. But that's not the point. The point is we are being asked to pay for what we already had, all while getting in the form of a weekly EPL game, something that very few of us actually want.

Not everyone has the proper internet connection quality to watch legal or illegal streams. Not everyone has the budget to splurge on pay television. And considering that we as Australian taxpayers (even those who contribute mostly through  paying GST because you don't make enough money to pay income taxes) have already paid for this, it is the height of robber-baron capitalism that we are asked to pay again for what we have already paid for.

And no, I will not pay for access, and no, I will not use the services of people who have. That's my pledge of pettiness to you, the reader.

I get that unlike our other erstwhile public broadcaster, SBS has particular commercial imperatives that they must satisfy. But it also has public broadcaster imperatives that it also needs to serve. Seeing as how they've reduced all their prime time viewing into English language programming, banished most of the foreign films in favour of mainstream American alternative cinema, and only play Miyazaki anime - in English dub - instead of the cooler stuff they used to dabble in, this move should come as no surprise.

[The most telling evidence of SBS selling out? Playing This is Spinal Tap instead of Get Ready to be Boyzvoiced]

That doesn't mean I'm happy about it, and it doesn't even make sense to me from a commercial aspects. Why sell out your world cup rights now, at the height of soccer's popularity in Australia? Because of Qatar and then 48 teams, this will be the last World Cup many people will likely care about so much, and now we get to see less of it because of EPL magic beans.

And no, watching games on delay is not cool. This isn't 1993, when those of us a certain vintage were happy and dumb enough to 'look away now' if we didn't want to know the score in order to pretend we were 'in the moment'.

So that's my final word on this matter from now up until the tournament starts and everyone else catches on about how SBS has dudded Australian soccer fans.

As an addendum to this post, some of the few who read my 2014 World Cup Heavy Sleeper work have wondered what will this mean for that feature's possible return next year. The truth is, I don't know. Part of what made the Heavy Sleeper work (in my opinion) was its amazing access to every game, provided I could wake up, which is obviously lessened now. Another aspect was its spontaneity, and I'm not sure I can replicate that.

But most importantly, the Heavy Sleeper was able to succeed as an immense piece of Great Art (whatever that is) because the tournament was great, and I was able to tap into joy for once - and for close to a whole month no less - instead of the unceasing negativity and moroseness that is South of the Border. Do people really want to read an angry and ceaselessly negative World Cup variant of what I do here? Do I even want to write that?

The answer to those questions is 'I don't know'. I was happy enough to let that glorious experiment remain as is, and I may still do so. But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Final thought

If @smfc had a Virtua Striker machine in the social club, they could fund an A-League team just on what I'd put in the machine.

— Paul Mavroudis (@PaulMavroudis) June 22, 2017

Highlights from first two rounds of 2012

Roudn 1 vs Moreland



Round 2 vs Oakleigh

All Over, Red Rover for Season 2011 - Oakleigh 1 South Melbourne 0

Curious. I did only write this up last night, but thought I had already posted it. 

The simple truth of the matter is that we created few chances and were reliant on Zaim Zeneli making several important saves. Oakleigh dominated us with their physical approach to the game - aided by lenient officials - and the absence of either Carl Recchia (playing in defense) or the suspended Sebastian Petrovich in midfield meant that far too often we were second to the ball and on the back foot.

Much speculation had been raised during the week over who who would take the place of Petrovich and the injured Steven Topalovic. The latter's place was unsurprisingly taken over by Rhodri Payne, while the former was the surprise of the night and perhaps season when Yanni Galanos, who had played all of 25 minutes for the entire campaign was picked ahead of Marinos Gasparis and Fernando De Moraes.

Hindsight is a terrific thing to have, but the coaching staff must have felt that Galanos' ability as a defensive midfielder would make up for the creativity lost by not playing one of the other two. As it turned out, even when Fernando did come on, he had little impact on the game, and as has often been the case, looked a shadow of his 2010 Gold Medal winning form. Galanos, too, had little impact, while Payne, so often a Jekyll and Hyde player, reverted to his Hyde persona, constantly giving the ball away in dangerous areas.

Fernando though, was not alone in producing a sub par performance. For whatever reason, the side looked flatfooted and bereft of ideas, with perhaps the effects of playing several cutthroat games in a row eventually taking its toll. From the Dandenong Thunder game onwards, just about every game the side had played was do or die. In some ways, it was a feat to reach this far, but five consecutive sudden death games was too much for the side.

Zeneli was undoubtedly South's best player. He pulled off several important saves, including one from point blank range in the first half. He was also the victim of two crude challenges, one of which by Oakleigh hardman/biggest dog in the VPL Josh Groenwald left Zeneli with a large gash on his head which required several minutes worth of medical attention. Neither challenge, nor several other rough moments, were dealt with in any serious manner by the officials except for belated yellow cards.

Perhaps the worst and most heinous of all those challenges was from former beloved captain Ramazan Tavsancioglu who, to borrow the words of one spectator, had been lining up Jesse Krncevic since January. An awfully late challenge on the striker off the ball in front of the South bench did little to endear the 2006 championship player to his critics, as well as denting the respect that he had among those supporters who sympathised with his exit from the club.

The closest we got to scoring was early on when Stephen Weir, who otherwise was shut out of the game, hit the crossbar; and midway through the second half, when Jesse Krncevic broke through for a one on one opportunity against Peter Zois, and while he put the ball in the back of the net, the flag had gone up for offside. From my vantage point behind that goal, my instinct was that it was a fair goal. Reports from the better placed patrons on the sideline generally claimed that it was onside, but there was the odd fan who claimed that it was offside. Perhaps the video, when it comes out, may clear up the matter. Perhaps not.

Coach Krncevic delayed in making substitutions, seemingly hoping that the game would reach extra time. It was always a dangerous tactic to pursue, and the team paid for its reluctance in going for the win when a long range shot by Oakleigh nestled into the opposite corner. The player had an eternity to line up the shot, and there was little that Zeneli could do to prevent it going in. Kyle Joryeff was brought on at the death, but had little chance to change the situation, and thus South's rollercoaster season ended with a whimper.

At the time of writing of course, the fate of the coach and several players was yet to be known, and is as usual likely to be hotly debated in the months ahead. As for the blog, the standard procedure will apply, as I wrap up the season that was, hand out the awards, let the Kiss of Death runs its course for 2011 and eventually slow down to the usual off-season pace.

Fair to say that I'm still devastated by the loss, but in full acknowledgment of the crazy season that we had.

The Peter Zois Barriers/The FFV wouldn't know what to do with a crowd
One of the more ludicrous things ever seen at a VPL game - and really, that's some effort to make such a shortlist - were the taped off areas behind each of the goals, allegedly to prevent the goalkeepers from having items thrown at them or have them come into contact with rowdy fans. Among a large part of the Clarendon Corner/smfcboard and assorted hangers on community, this was taken as at least a moral victory for the vocal fan known as Stathi.

Stathi is not even close to approaching any sort of wordsmithery. He can be crude, but he generally never enters the more turgid and offensive territory of the fan known as Columbo, who is currently serving a suspension for his role in last year's pitch invasion against Heidelberg. Both have their supporters and detractors. For all the antics of this game however, Peter Zois didn't snap this time until the end of the game, when he turned around to pick up his towel and grab hold of the badge on his chest and step forward to try and have a few words.

What price Zois places on any sense of loyalty to any club is a mystery to me, and probably many other VPL folk who could rattle off several clubs he has been at and left - but perhaps that is hypocritical to point out considering that we were at least fourth in line out of those clubs. Still, the whole 'I love this club' saga obviously did rankle with him, and will do so into the future. That, and the fact that Joe Keenan speaks better Greek than he does.

As for the FFV, a large crowd turned up, were accommodated poorly both in lining up and inside the ground, and left the poor security staff to their own wits as to how to try and prevent a pathetic barrier not be moved at all. By the time the game had ended, the blockaded area I was behind in the second half had moved closer to the fence by about 3-4 metres, almost as if by magic. There was also a moderately dicey moment early in the game when the lights flickered ominously, but they stayed on. The field itself was a bobbling hovel, sand everywhere and not suited to playing a decent brand of football. Still, if we'd had the double chance we perhaps could have avoided the situation.

The FFV's idea of soccer crowd control. It's so genius that they should think about exporting it to the Balkans or South America. Photo: Gains.

Drinking/How Clarendon Corner keeps on keeping on
I do like a drop of cider, but never to excess.

Clarendon Corner almost always rises to the occasion at Jack Edwards Reserve, and last night was no exception. The return of Lefteri helped things even further, and the interplay with the behind the goals crowd was also very good, considering there were very few chanting types on that side.

Apparently next year is Clarendon's 10th anniversary, with the majority of that spell being spent in the club's most difficult years. For better and worse, it's been one constant that has kept some people coming back, and provided a bit of atmosphere, colour and a point of difference to the other clubs and their crowds that increasingly being made up of old men. I've never always approved, occasionally found myself on the opposite side of an issue, and tend not to forgive the mistakes, but at the same time, been through a lot of good times as well. Maybe time to finally bury whatever hatchets we all have?

In the end, it's the result that counts - Oakleigh 1 South Melbourne 0

One early defensive mistake cost us the game last night, but what can you do? Not that we played the most sterling football, but we easily outplayed them, had far more chances, and were let down by our finishing and crossing. A bit of luck wouldn't have hurt too. We had only two freekicks in the first half hour, not one freekick in our final third for the entire match, and basically saw just about every 50/50 decision go Oaks way. Oh well. If we play that way we'll win most games I fancy, but the defending needs to shape up a bit, still plenty of communication problems and poor clearances.

We don't have a game now until the 24th March. O'Dor's red card (2 yellows) means he'll be sitting one or two games. Yusef got a pretty bad injury to his knee it seems. A chance to regroup and refuel now. Effort wise I cannot fault the team, they gave it their all and should've taken all three points. But that's football.

Pre-Season Madness

This post was originally published on the Park Life blog by Supermercado/Adam 1.0.

Note: This site does not go in for match analysis and rating. In fact we don't know what the fuck is going on half the time. Until somebody else writes a match report that we can beg to print it'll be half arsed observation and farce all around.

The South pre-season world tour continued at Oakleigh's Jack Edwards Reserve on Sunday in front of a relatively large crowd. Bigger than what we got in the last round of 2005 at home to Bentleigh anyway. SMFC took the lead in the first half through new signing Kevin Nelson and were unlucky to go into half-time at one apiece after a scramble in the sandpit goalmouth at the city end of the alternative pitch resulted in the ball being kicked out of Dean Anastasiadis' hands and into the goal.

The makeshift defence, consisting of a triallist from the Ivory Coast (!) on the right and a guy who was a 100% dead ringer for Thomas Gravesen on the right held up well in the 2nd half under almost constant pressure, and only cracked in the 90+ minute when former NSL player Esala Masi scored the winner for the Cannons and sent a group of watching Fijians into rapture. One in particular completely lost the plot. Standing up on a chair and yelling like they'd just won the World Cup. Maybe somebody told him it was the A-League and he was enjoying football but not as he knew it?

Next stop - Springvale White Eagles in the Crazy John's Cup @ BJS next Sunday.