Bobbin' up! - South Melbourne 5 Melbourne Knights 1

Does our fate lie in the hands of our youth? Manny Aguek, Pep Marafioti,
and the back of someone's head celebrate a goal. Photo: Mark Avellino.

The scene was set for another disastrous Sunday afternoon. Northcote had lost. Hume had lost. Kingston had lost. Even those recent form finders Bulleen had lost, thanks in part to a Michael Eagar header, which shows that at least someone out there still likes us. So there we were, another opportunity to get out of the relegation zone, just waiting for us to screw it up.

That's not taking anything away from the Melbourne Knights, who despite their own limitations have been hovering around the fringe finals places for most of the season, as opposed to where we are. But neither are they anything special. The idea among South fans, if not quite the belief, was that by our own low standards this game against the Knights were certainly winnable; and if we didn't win it - so the more extreme verbosity went - we were goners.

And why not? We'd still have Bentleigh, Gully, Avondale and Heidelberg away, and the Bergers at home as well, fixtures about which most assume - with some justification - that we'll probably get nothing from.

So at best we went into this match with a threadbare list - no George Howard (who somehow only got two weeks for his crazy tackle the week before), no Ndumba Makeche (probably out for several weeks with a hammy), no Milos Lujic (sunning it up in the Greek islands), and no Matthew Millar not only for this week but also for every week thereafter. Thus the notion that Knights fielded a depleted line up - probably true - should've been met with the response of, "yeah, and, so, what?". We've been fielding depleted lineups the whole damn year.

One thing we had an advantage in was the Knights personnel or at least some members thereof having probably stayed up or gotten up very early to watch Croatia's World Cup quarter final appearance, but who knows how many players from both sides had been clubbing the night before? At any rate, sleepiness can only excuse some of the nonsense play that Knights dished up. The bad throw from the keeper which led to Marcus Schroen being fouled on the edge of the box? Sleepy. But the appalling wall set up in front of the free kick from which Schroen scored with a grubber shot? Very bad, much as Knights set up a shocking wall last year for Schroen to bypass.

"KK" sounds like a court transcript identity given
 to a crown witness testifying against the mob.

The second goal came from a corner, which I suppose was our tribute to the 2018 World Cup and/or It's Coming Home. I guess since we never really even put in enough decent crosses from corners most of the time, Knights can hardly be blamed for falling asleep and letting Kristian Konstantinids float in unmarked for an easy header from the first flicked on effort.

The third goal, which for most other teams would seal the win, even before halftime, was even crazier for its combination of defensive sleepiness and carelessness. How Schroen was given that much space on the right is anyone's guess, but even better was that abysmal attempt at a clearance which by going backwards set up an otherwise offside Oliver Minatel for his sixth goal of the season, and yet another goal in his novelty tally.

There's probably some mathematical formula for how big a lead this South Melbourne team needs in order to win a game, involving complex formulations based on score, time left, rating of an opponent. While I'm not qualified to create said formula, it's fair to say that the gut feel about the place while happy with the 3-0 lead - how could one not be? - was also not really convinced about its impregnability. That's no false modesty on our part, because it's after halftime in most of our games where things have gotten particularly bad.

And the second half started off in much that vein, as we gave too much space to the Knights. It was a good thing that their end product was not nearly up to the standard of this season's leading sides. Eventually our compact, simplified game plan worked to our advantage in terms of shutting this game out, with Pep Marafioti winning a penalty and converting it to seal the win. The goal we coughed was not good, a mostly unforced defensive error gifting the Knights a goal if not much else.

But then we added a fifth from another counter, debutant Manylauk "Manny" Aguek nodding on a ball to Schroen, whose cross was met well and stylishly by an unmarked Marafioti. It goes to my opinion of Schroen that there's no real middle ground in terms of his performances: they're either brilliant or somewhere at the other, less reputable end of the scale. Marafioti's finish here (despite its lack of pressure) as well as his spectacular finish against Northcote, suggests to me that he should perhaps be the undisputed spearhead for the rest of the season, or at least until Makeche and/or Lujic are genuine options. Leigh Minopoulos slugged it out for 75 odd minutes, but you worry about how much each extra minute beyond a certain amount diminishes his fitness and chronic injury status.

The use of the under 20s players - and further to that, the whole three substitutes available - warmed the hearts of the fans, because they had a go and looked OK. Much as some of the senior players aren't happy to be subbed - Minatel looks especially annoyed when he comes off early - it makes sense in situations like this because we don't want him picking up extra yellow cards which could see our first or second most important player (after Nikola Roganovic) miss a game because of something which had no consequence on a match already won.

I'm not going to go overboard with the praise for Aguek and fellow debutant Will Orford, because the game was won by the time they came on, and the opponent wasn't really switched on. Still, it makes you wonder why some of these boys, or others like them, couldn't have been used earlier in the season even if they weren't considered quite ready yet. After all, sometimes inexperienced but fresher and fitter players are surely better than experienced but hobbled players? But that's one of the recriminations we'll return to at the end of the season, hopefully having secured another season in this tier of the Victorian NPL. Until that time, we make do with what we have - perhaps acknowledging that we have a little more in available playing stocks than we thought we did - and do our best until we can reset properly next year.

Relegation-survival prognostication

No point in including the teams immediately above us, let alone the ones in
finals contention. As you can see (click to enlarge), we still have much to do.

So after all of that, a fifth win for the season and more importantly, jumping out of the relegation zone by a whole two ladder positions.

There's a prognosticating arithmetic game going on among some fans about how many more points we'll need to avoid the drop, but there's still too many games to go before we can forecast those scenarios with any certainty - though when it comes time to doing so, there is an online tool on the NPL results pages that will let you speculate to your heart's content.

Here anyway are some unsolicited data points to keep in mind in terms of the number of points required to stay out of relegation since the onset of the NPL in Victoria in 2014, keeping in mind that 12th is the playoff spot and 13th and 14th are the automatic relegation places.

12th place finishers

• 2014 - 28 points - Werribee finished behind 11th placed Port Melbourne on goal difference.
• 2015 - 21 points - North Geelong finished five points behind 11th placed Oakleigh.
• 2016 - 23 points - Richmond finished two points behind 11th placed Bulleen.
• 2017 - 24 points - Melbourne Knights finished three points behind 11th placed Port Melbourne.

As you can see there's great variety in the number of points that the 12th placed teams were able to accrue, and how far behind they finished behind the next best side. There's also notable variance in terms of each season having weaker or stronger teams finishing in the bottom three as a whole, where it might be useful to look at the point tallies of the bottom three sides for each of those seasons.

• 2014 - 65 points
• 2015 - 54 points
• 2016 - 53 points (this doesn't include Victory's six point deduction)
• 2017 - 49 points

The 2018 points tally for the bottom three teams right now, with seven games to go, is already at 47. That tells us that this season's relegation dodgers and even the 12th placed playoff teams are probably going to have pick up more points than usual to achieve safety. Disregarding whatever points the bottom five teams may pick up against opponents higher up the ladder - or whether teams like Dandenong, Knights or Oakleigh could somehow be dragged into the scrap, though I think that's unlikely - there are also five fixtures where the bottom five teams are set to play each other:

• Round 20, Hume vs Bulleen
• Round 21, South vs Hume, Kingston vs Northcote
• Round 24, Northcote vs Bulleen, South vs Kingston

Each current bottom five side gets two shots at beating at a fellow relegation rival, which says that as important as picking up points against everyone else will be, there are likely five season defining matches whose importance cannot be overstated - and the fact that we haven't managed to pick up wins against Northcote and Bulleen this year could well come back to bite us.

But let's not forget goal difference, and the game in hand we that we have. Though we hope that it doesn't come to that, at the moment we have significantly better goal difference than every team in the relegation battle; but a couple of heavy losses coupled with a couple of big wins to a relegation rival could also negate that.

So yeah, beating the Knights and getting out of the relegation zone? Great! Getting complacent about our chances of survival? Not on your life.

Next game
Bentleigh Greens at Kingston Heath on Friday night. We weren't winning there against the Greens when we were good, now that we're not very good I anticipate even greater struggles. But Bentleigh play the Bergers in the Dockerty Cup final tonight, so maybe they'll destroy each other by accumulating a ton of straight reds, injuries, and taking the game all the way to a penalty shoot out which keeps going into the following morning. Even then, I'm not expecting any miracles.

Farewell Matthew Millar
It's official: after a three week trial in Gosford, Matthew Millar has signed a one year deal with the Central Coast Mariners. While I will continue to be mystified about why it took the Mariners three whole weeks to figure out what Millar's all about as a player, I guess this is good news for him. While (probably) far too many players get immediate second chances in the A-League, there are not so many that can bounce back after getting dumped back to the state leagues for a season or two.

It's less than good news for us though, as whatever we South fans may think of Millar's deficiencies as a player, he was more than serviceable for us during his time with us, and it's one less experienced - and as importantly, fit - senior player available to us for the rest of the year. All that we get from it is some bonus points in the player points system that no one monitors anyway, maybe some minimal compensation (who knows?), and no chance (I assume) to replace him with any current free agents.

At least it's certain now that those damn inflatable apples will never see the light of day again at a South Melbourne match.

Around the grounds
That's it, back to Winnipeg Geelong!
My first time attending an Altona East home game this season. Blame scheduling conflicts? There's a bit of that, though hanging out at a couple of Kensington City games wasn't the sharpest idea in the shed. Blame the standard? I've watched a fair few other state league two games this year, and a couple of state five games. Blame the distance from Sunshine to Altona North? A very lame excuse. Blame the footy? Yeah, maybe. At any rate, it took long enough for me to get out to Paisley Park this year that I didn't even bother using my media pass to get in, just chucked the gate attendant a fiver and headed straight for the canteen,. PAOK's opponent on the day was Geelong Rangers, a team performing very much like PAOK this season: not good enough to be pushing for promotion, far too good to be in the relegation zone. I spent most of this game chatting to a South fan I met for the first time that day, not a bad conversation about many different things and people, which was a pleasant distraction from the not terribly inspiring match. Rangers took the lead in the first half, deservedly so, and it wasn't clear how an Altona East side that's hardly free scoring was going to work their way into the game. Well, 25 yard top corner screamers and curling shots from the edge of the box help. By full time it was 4-1, and Rangers like the rest of us must've been wondering where East managed to pull out that kind of football from. Makes you want to go there again to watch more of that style.

Final thought
We will fund our A-League enterprise by playing Croatian matches at the 2018 World Cup on loop in our social club, attracting local Croatians to our bar like moths to a flame.

South of the Border Awards 2017

Player of the year: Nick Epifano. The People's Champ missed the first five games, but was one of the two catalysts - along with Michael Eagar - for our turnaround in form after the poor start to the season. His performances were more even across the season than they have been in the past, and his effort on the defensive side of the game also improved a lot. Here's hoping that this season is a launching pad to an even better season next year.

Under 21 player of the year: The Cliff Hussey Memorial Trophy goes to Matthew Millar. Two years in a row, thank goodness he turned 21 in August so he can't win it again next season.

Goal of the year: Milos Lujic vs Knights at home. Yes it was a great goal, an atypical one for six yard box specialist like Milos, but its timing - after a half where we'd been pretty well outplayed and should've been down 2-0 at least - adds to the magic.

Best performance: against Heidelberg at the Bubbledome. Played them off the park from beginning to end.

Best away game of the year: I didn't go, but apparently the trip to the Gold Coast was pretty wild.

Call of the year: 'Come on Laura, miss it for South!' - me, at former South player Laura Spiranovic as she was taking a penalty in the shoot-out for Geelong Galaxy in the grand final against South. Laura missed.

Chant of the year: A-League or NPL / It doesn't matter to us/ The only thing that really matters / Is South Melbourne Hellas. Honourable mentions to 'Bill Paps is on fire the truth is terrified', and,'Sing us a song you're a Hellas fan', even if only like three of us actually

Best pre-match/after match dinner location: The social club wins by default. It'll have to lift its game next year though.

Friends we lost along the way: The social club count up clock. Smfcboard.com. Paul Henning. :(

Barely related to anything stupidity highlight of the year: I mean, where do you start? Misplaced fingers? Alleged spitting? Players going on holidays during the season? The visa player who spent most of his time in the 20s? Me beating Big Griff on FIFA 15 in the social club by having some random PAOK player's shot dribble underneath Mat Ryan? My image being plastered all over Windsor station by a bunch of kids?

I could go on. But I think the award should go to the West of the Quarry Twitter account, which a few rounds into the season was having a right old laugh at our very poor start to the season, only to see the tables turned pretty quickly.

That awkward moment when you laugh at South for being in the relegation zone a few weeks into the season.

— West of the Quarry (@wotq53) May 14, 2017

At least they admitted their mea culpa. Going to so many of their games this season was almost as enjoyable as going to our games. Too bad that it seems they've got their act together for 2018.

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

Monday night football still sucks - Kingston City 1 South Melbourne 2

Like last week, the collective amorphous 'we' chose some less than ideal spots to watch this game from, the second half less worse than the first because at least it had some elevation. But, and this is so good, having decided at the last moment to move around to a different sport from where we had been, Milos Lujic's goal 30 seconds into the game was missed by the lemming ensemble. No matter, just because we didn't see it, doesn't mean it doesn't count.

At the same time, we had to deal with a bloke wearing a South scarf being escorted rather unwillingly out of the ground by security/ground marshals. We had seen this gentleman banging away at the back of one of the benches, not incoherently but quite clearly to the rhythm of a traditional Hellas chant. Only later did we learn that he happened to be Gavin De Niese's dad, but also that he'd thrown a bin over the South bench. One suspects he may have just received the news that his son, who has not been able to break out of the under 20s side, is to be let go - but that is just me being speculative.

[disputed remnants of Clarendon Corner intolerable in-joke digression - as one wit noted, no one thought we'd top the 'wet socks' fiasco from last week during the rest of the season, but here we are a week later with 'bingate'.]

The first half settled into a pattern of stupid but funny UFO related chants and the team playing pretty well. Some better crossing (even though it wasn't so bad this week as compared to last), someone waiting to pounce on the loose ball, and even a bit more luck for Milos would have seen us go ahead by two or three goals. Lujic's quick header in particular was one of those moments where you feel that last year he would've scored the same thing, but it's not worth being harsh on an opportunity that came onto him so quickly.

Anyway, because we didn't score, Kingston did. They relied a bit more on the counter attack then I thought they would, and they'd usually try to shoot from longer range than they perhaps needed to. But since we were unable to get the ball back into the mixer with as much reliability as we should have - perhaps it would've been better to have Matthew Foschini instead of Jesse Daley in that role - Kingston were entitled to try and absorb pressure, being under siege as they were, and relying on pace to get them up the field.

The one time they did get proper close to goal, former South man Chris Irwin latched on to a good pass and made the most of an out of shape back line to slot it past Nikola Roganovic. Some people (not me, for once) must have felt at the time that it was a crime to have let him go, and wasn't it amazing what he could do when not coming off the bench in the 93rd minute as a time-wasting sub.

Not that one felt that we couldn't get the lead again, but it sucked to have conceded even against a nimble and pacey attack like Kingston's. The second half was more of the same as far as I'm concerned except that, as noted earlier, perhaps our vantage point behind the goals at the eastern end of the ground was not the best place to watch the game from for analytical purposes.

It was the best place from which to see Marcus Schroen blast the ball over from range when a low drive would have done the job with the Kingston keeper way out of position. It was also a good place to watch the home side's defense block shots off the line. It was also, sadly, a magnificent position from which to watch Lujic miss an absolute sitter, which looked much worse from behind the goals than it did from the live feed - and it looked pretty bad from there.

With the People's Champ having played in Stefan Zinni - yes, he's actually back from his A-League sojourn, contrary to some things I had been hearing - the young winger passed the ball across the face inviting Lujic to score into an unguarded goal at the back post. Except that Lujic somehow launched it over the bar and possibly adding to the Westall UFO mystery in the process. At that point you had the feeling that we'd find a way to lose this game, but instead we scored our best team goal of the season. I'm not going to say it was some master class of planning and sequential deliberation - and it was helped by a Kingston player being caught ball watching and not tracking Matthew Millar into the box - but they all count the same.

And what's more, the finish was delightful, Millar calmly chipping the ball over the keeper and getting the ball to be at the right height and velocity to make it impossible for the defenders to clear it. Millar now has six goals in maybe almost as many games. I don't know what to make of it. What I do know however is that the 'Apples' nickname and associated chant is a bloody stupid gimmick and I won't have anything to do with it.

We were a little lucky not to be caught falling asleep at the wheel from a Kingston counter attack - Irwin should have done better with the chance, but he fluffed it, and maybe some people (not me, for once) must have felt at the time that it was hardly a crime to have let him go, and wasn't it amazing what he couldn't do when not coming off the bench in the 93rd minute as a time-wasting sub.

Anyway, we won the game, I've lost track of how many that is on the trot now, and are within three points (or something like that) of top spot in a crowded upper(!) half of the table, And some of people (maybe even me) wanted this entire team thrown on a barge which had been set alight and shipped off down the Yarra and into the ocean, viking style. How times change. Just don't check back in here in the event that next Wednesday night it all goes to crap again.

[By the way, how much would such a barge cost do you reckon? I'm thinking we should get a crowd funding scheme to buy one, so we could chuck the entire Melbourne Rebels organisation onto it and float it out to sea. Whatever it takes to get 'professional' and unnecessary rugby union out of Melbourne]

Next game
Bulleen at home on Sunday, the first of a very long series of home matches. I think Matthew Foschini is going to miss courtesy of pickup up five yellow cards. A few others will have to be careful not to pick up their own fifth yellow card, seeing as how the FFA Cup is on straight after the league game.

FFA Cup news
Our match against Dandenong City has been scheduled for Wednesday May 24th at Lakeside. Get your pitchforks and/or floral tributes ready for either of the scenarios.

Periodic burst of public transport user virtue signalling
The journey there was uneventful, except for the decision to take the winding backstreet path, often through poorly lit streets. The journey back, well... fairly brisk 15 minute walk back to Westall station. Pretty good connection with the next train to the city, except that it only went as far as Caulfield, because of some sort of works. Thus it was on to a replacement bus to South Yarra, not too bad considering it was not an express. Then a quick connection to the next city bound train at South Yarra, unfortunately ending up at the back end of platform 13. Plenty of time to get to platform 4 for 11:58 Sunbury service. Got home some time around 00:30. Good thing I didn't have anywhere to be on Tuesday.

Transfer window open
The transfer window is apparently open. Who knows if we have any loose change to spend, who's going, and where we might look to for reinforcements. I'm reading 'not much', 'Carl Piergianni', and 'who knows?'. Among other things (ie, another striker), the fans seem to want an attacking midfielder - one that isn't Andy Kecojevic, who isn't getting a game anyway, nor the People's Champ, who has been played there as a stop-gap measure at times - and preferably one that isn't cup tied. As noted earlier, Stefan Zinni has returned, having completed his stint at Western Sydney Wanderers - where he didn't get much game time. As a winger, he'll be competing against Leigh Minopoulos, Jesse Daley, and whoever else Chris Taylor likes to throw out on the wing. I don't know about our PPS situation either, but conceivably the club knows what it's doing (all hail the all-knowing club people squirrelling away in the back rooms, and not on the internet) on this front, and thus that won't be a major issue.

Languid
I had been asked by a famous journo friend to attend North Sunshine vs Preston (true story), but I did the right thing and trundled over to Lakeside on Saturday afternoon, through the Shanghai-like haze - now that's bravery for you. And it's not like anything of not happened out at Larissa Reserve anyway, if you know what I mean.

I was at Lakeside to watch the women's team play Heidelberg, which provided the chance for our WNPL side to rack up some goals and boost the plus/minus differential against the struggling visitors. But first there was the issue of lunch. The open souv has changed, more expensive now to distinguish it from the closed/takeaway variant. It's also more in the vein of what'd you get in terms of a plated souv at various Greek restaurants - meat, salad (not the caramelised onion of before), chips, pita, tzatziki on the side. They've also brought in a couple of new craft beers on tap.  But they also trialled brining in some pastries, and this I also pigged out on a very buttery danish. I thought everything was very good, but others may be less impressed by everything. It's not in my nature to complain after all.

Caitlin Greiser has won an athletic scholarship to the US.
Photo: Damjan JanevskiStar Weekly.

The game itself was not lacklustre, but it did lack something. Maybe because both sides have played three games in a week due to cup commitments. Maybe because of no Lisa De Vanna, reputedly dealing with a hamstring injury. Maybe it was because Heidelberg are anchored near the bottom? Probably all three of those reasons contributed.

South dominated this game from start to finish, with Heidelberg rarely mounting a meaningful attack. While South was unlucky to a degree - the girls hit the woodwork a couple of times - it took until the last ten minutes of the half to convert that dominance into goals. When we ended the half 3-0 up, not only was the game cooked, but one began to wonder how many more we'de end up with. As it turned out, the halftime score was also the full time score, as for whatever reason the team wasn't able to convert its mountain of possession into meaningful chances. So, while we chalked up the win we were expected to, it was a missed opportunity in terms of bettering our goal difference. This week our women host the ladder leading Calder at home at 1:30, as the curtain raiser to the men's game against Bulleen.

Today's game won't live long in the memory but the form of @gummmybear3 & @solodoloJOLO has @smfc well placed in the #PS4NPLWVIC title race pic.twitter.com/YtjfGONl20

— Teo Pellizzeri (@teopellizzeri) May 13, 2017

Match programme uploads
I've uploaded some more South vs Newcastle and Newcastle vs South match progammes, including the Michael Schumacher special! Thanks to Todd Giles for those. I've also added the recent Bentleigh vs South programme - it isn't much to look at, but at least it exists - and a Knights vs South programme from 2014 which I had stashed away but had forgotten to upload.
 
I've also added more editions of Soccer News with text recognition (1961 and 1964) after Mark Boric recently updated his collection.

Video uploads
Relive the terrifying lows, the dizzying highs, the creamy middles.. in other words, I've finished uploading all the 2005-2007 South Melbourne videos I had at my disposal. Next step is to somehow get access to the Greek Media Groups' archives to get as much of their footage online as possible. Don't hold your breath. Thanks to Box, Gav, and whoever else put these games on DVD in the first place.

Around the grounds
As for the match itself, well...
Decided to walk towards Ralph Reserve from my house, a leisurely 15 minute stroll, for Western Suburbs vs Altona East. About halfway there you could smell the souvs, but wouldn't you know it, when I eventually decided to get one, one of the volunteers threw a tantrum while I was waiting in line and the canteen was unilaterally closed for five minutes. As this was five minutes before kickoff - and it's hard to tweet and eat at the same time - I had to wait until the halftime break. Aside from that, I had to deal with the Bentleigh Peanut Man having a go at me for being a Hellas fan at non-South game, and then becoming chatty with me and offering me a lift back from The Grange to Westall on the next night if I needed one. As for the game itself, pretty freaking ordinary. East will be shattered not only that they lost 4-1, but that they copped the same goal three times.

Final thought
Outside the ground, someone had placed one of those cleaners' "caution - wet floor" signs on the grassy path. Not sure if they were being serious or hilarious.

South of the Border Awards 2016

Clearly I put as much thought and care into these things as I usually do.

Player of the year: Nikola Roganovic, who apart from Milos Lujic, almost singlehandedly kept us near the top of the table, and who pulled off two wonder saves in the grand final. Apologies to Milos Lujic, who would have won it any other year.

Under 21 player of the year: The Cliff Hussey Memorial Trophy goes to Matthew Millar. This is especially pertinent once I realised he was only 20, and not something like 23. Apologies to no one else.

Goal of the year: Iqi Jawadi away at Port Melbourne. A goal so good, it destroyed his South career. Marcus Schroen would have won it if he scored from that free kick in the grand final, or from any free kick for that matter, because no one scores from free kicks for us pretty much ever.

Best performance: Round 1, Bergers at home. Maybe I should have picked a game where we didn't win thanks in part to a red card, but good luck finding that game. Apologies to the first seventy minutes or so against Bentleigh in the league - you were scuttled by a) bad coaching and b) losing.

Best away game of the year: Victory away. 'So much to do at Cartmanland, but you can't come' and all that. Apologies to those of you who couldn't get in to that game, and for whom the best away game would probably have been the Heidelberg semi-final I suppose.

Call of the year: The Melbourne Knights fan at Somers Street who abused the officials (who got the relevant offside call and subsequent red card absolutely right, then abused MFootball's commentary team accusing them of being biased because he thought they were working for Greek radio. Apologies to myself for several witty comments made throughout the year.

Chant of the year: '6-5, on aggregate!' You shouldn't hand out such awards to yourself, but desperate times call for desperate measures, and that chant probably saved a few people from going catatonic with rage that night. Apologies to 'thanks for beating Bentleigh' from the grand final.

Best pre-match/after match dinner location: Nasi lemak at Old Town White Coffee. Apologies to the fifty bazillion Korean fried chicken places we went to. No apologies to places that sponsored the club, because you all dropped the ball at some point.

Friends we (apparently) lost along the way:Another umbrella. Maybe Skip Fulton. Possibly West of the Quarry.

Barely related to anything stupidity highlight of the year: Steve from Broady's initial itinerary for his trip to Perth to watch the Socceroos vs Iraq. Unfortunately he came to his senses and avoided creating a sequel to Planes, Trains and Automobiles.