Showing posts with label Paisley Park Soccer Complex. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Paisley Park Soccer Complex. Show all posts

Thursday, 21 April 2016

Dimness - Altona Magic 0 South Melbourne 3

Disclaimer
I was playing the part of one of South's designated supporter marshals during this fixture.

Prologue
Find a calm lake and wait for the twilight in silence! There, existence will visit you with all its magnificence! The existence of the Existence can best be felt in the presence of dimness and in the absence of crowds and noises!
 - Mehmet Murat Ildan

First Intermediate Period
Things started off dim at Paisley Park last night,
then proceeded to get darker,
and all this before the game had even kicked off - a kick off which was delayed a few minutes because of the lights needing to be turned back on and get up to the maximum lux setting, or something like that. As I remarked to a one time contributor to the blog, it was a bit early for Δεύτε λάβετε φως for the mostly at least nominally Orthodox Christians in attendance.

Finally underway... but mostly Magic, not so much us.
Even with the lights on though, things would just continue to head down a murky path for the rest of the evening. For example, Kristian Konstantinidis was named in the starting line up,
but didn't seem to be on the field, replaced by Luke Adams. It seems that 'KK' may have injured himself during the warm-up, but we'll need official confirmation on that. Otherwise the lineup was reasonably strong - still mostly made up of players who had recently won championships and were part of the side that was top of the Victorian leagues - but one wondered whether the changes would both unsettle a side that had finally seemed to get in sync last Sunday against Oakleigh after several wonky weeks, but also would it be of sufficient quality to withstand the efforts of a very capable Altona Magic outfit.

The answers to those questions seemed to be 'yes', and 'not really', as South not only failed to mount any meaningful attacks during the first half, but were lucky not to be down by a couple of goals at half time. Magic, who were particularly keen on exploiting our right hand side, were undone by Nikola Roganovic on the hand and their own profligate finishing on the other. The only obvious solution for us seemed to be to make some changes and bring on some more of our A-Listers, but instead we persisted with the same lineup after the break, hoping they would come good.

And somewhat surprisingly, that's actually what happened. Chris Irwin, part of that problematic right hand side in the first half, came out a changed player, tormenting the Magic defence. It was he who burst through the lines to find himself one on one with the keeper, only to be fouled in the box and have his shot trickle wide. Confusion reigned for a minute or so, as clearly referee Lucien Laverdure had given a card to the Magic defender responsible for the foul, but had not given a signal for the penalty - had he paid the advantage instead? As it turned out, Laverdue did award the penalty, and then the lights went out again.

Second Intermediate Period
The crowd was pretty good for a Wednesday night, with most reasonable estimates ranging from 800-1000. Alongside Magic's usual supporters and their juniors, there was quite a healthy number of South fans, as well as a group of Preston fans - the 'Preston Makedonia' chants seemed to give that one away - though at least one person on the forums contended that Magic have their own active supporter crew, which makes a kind of sense insofar as that chanting group was standing behind a banner containing an Altona Magic logo.
Whoever they were and however they identified themselves, one hoped against history that they were there for the spectacle and the possibility of an upset and humiliation of a rival, and nothing more than that. Unfortunately one coward from that group couldn't help himself, coming up behind a cluster of South fans and throwing a lit flare into said cluster, hitting a young woman. She received medical attention - and I assume she is OK, but again, have no confirmation of that - and one felt that things were about to kick off. How could they not, considering the proximity of those Preston/active Altona fans to the travelling South contingent?

Somehow, despite the combination of the obvious anger of the South fans, the close proximity of the supporters to each other, the darkness and the empty spaces behind the hill, as well as the security force which seemed less than well prepared for such an incident, things didn't escalate beyond words. At least some of the credit for that has to go to those South fans who managed to keep their more aggrieved mates in check, as well as the Altona Magic marshals, who were unequivocal so far as I could tell in getting the relevant 'home' support group to move away from the South fans (even if not quite far enough for some tastes), as well as telling others to just go home.

There were reports that the flare thrower was identified, but as with many of the specifics of the incident, I have seen no official confirmation of that. A police car did arrive, but what exactly they ended up doing, I don't know. With regards to the collective identity of the group that the flare thrower came from, it was interesting in that Magic themselves put the following up on Twitter,
as well as
It will be very interesting to see what comes out of this. One hopes of course that the flare thrower was identified, and will have the full force of the law come down upon them. It will be interesting to see also what punishment Magic will receive and how FFV will handle this. One interesting thing which occurred during the game in the online sphere - a sphere I did not have access to because of my marshalling duties - was the categorisation of the scenes as 'chaos at Paisley Park'. I think that tends to gild the lily somewhat - while there was much confusion due to both whether the game would get called off, as well as the aftermath of the flare incident, chaos did not break out as far as I'm concerned, even if the potential for it to do so was certainly there.

The game itself emerges out of stasis
The game resumed, with Marcus Schroen putting away the penalty in less than convincing fashion - but the important thing is that he did put it away, and now the game could be played on our terms. Magic had to push forward, and had a penalty shout called a dive, but when Milos Lujic bundled home a goal mouth scramble from a corner, we were pretty much there. When Magic's Bozinovski was sent off after receiving a second yellow card - Magic had received a free kick, and Schroen a yellow card himself for unnecessary shirtfront-esque attempt at protecting the ball, with Bozinovski than grabbing and throwing Schroen to the ground - our progress to the next round was official. Lujic's injury time tap in made the score look a lot more flattering it should have been.

In the end, because of both the way the team had performed in the first half, as well as the flare incident during the lights out period, one came out of this match as a South fan with relief at having progressed as well as not been part of a much larger and more violent incident. It was our first win at Paisley Park in since we beat Moorabbin in the Dockerty Cup in 1996, and our first win against Altona Magic at this venue since the 1993 Dockerty Cup, a record which sounds pretty until you remember that our only extended run of games there was from 2005-2010. One could have hoped for a more dull affair, but it's nice to also get that monkey off our backs.

Next game
Melbourne Victory youth team at Lakeside on Sunday. This game will be subject to changed security and seating conditions.
SMFC members and supporters will be required to enter Lakeside Stadium through the traditional Gate 2 entry point and base themselves in the traditional SMFC grandstand as normal. This includes all SMFC players (all ages) and parents, as well as FFV and FFA accredited pass holders. 
Melbourne Victory (NPL) supporters will enter through the Gate 1 entry point and be based in the opposite grandstand. 
All patrons are reminded that any anti-social behaviour contravening the Football Federation Victoria (FFV) and South Melbourne FC Code of Conduct will not be tolerated. There are several CCTV security cameras operating in and around Lakeside Stadium that will be used to identify anyone engaging in anti-social behaviour. 
With a large crowd expected, SMFC is working closely with Melbourne Victory, FFV, Blue Thunder Security, the State Sports Centre Trust and Victoria Police to ensure a great afternoon for everyone at Lakeside Stadium on Sunday afternoon. 
Sunday’s main match kicks off at 5pm, with our Under 20s match commencing at 2.30pm. SMFC will also be honouring the memory of the ANZACS in a short ceremony prior to the main game commencing.
Around the grounds
Science of the Cup
Of the three FFA Cup options available on Tuesday night, I decided to take a punt, or perhaps just chose the closest option to my place and headed to Somers Street for Avondale Heights vs South Springvale Aris. Things did not begin well:
But to the ground announcer's credit, he was at least an equal opportunity butcher.
But then Avondale proceeded to throw away any sympathy by doing this:
Now South Springvale had a reputation of getting above their station in this competition in recent years, so one hoped perhaps that lightning could strike yet again. This was not to be the case, as they were outclassed from the start. Yes, some Aris players had some nice close control, but when it came time to actually control possession, the best they could usually do was three or four passes before bombing it long to an isolated forward. Avondale were getting frustrated with their inability to open the scoring, but eventually broke through seconds before half time and as far as I was concerned, they may as well as have ended the game there. The goals piled on in the second half, but to their credit Aris kept pushing on and managed to get one goal back from the penalty spot, but one goal is fewer than five, and we ain't using no golf handicap system here. Overall, I felt a bit annoyed that I'd bothered to get dressed for this.

Final thought
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Tuesday, 27 August 2013

Too Much Entertainment - South Melbourne 3 Pascoe Vale 2

This article is late partly because I went out drinking, in my own very limited way.

I have even less idea than usual of what happened at this game. I mean, you tell me what was going on out there on Sunday evening?

For some reason we played at 5:00 instead of 3:00. Rather than being a cold, windy evening, the weather was unusually pleasant. We came into this game with some sort of form. Several results went our way. And I swear the canteen people also keep changing their kransky supplier, and despite being overpriced at $7.50 (and I swear they used to be $8), they actually have some flavour to them now.

As for the game itself, we got the good start, courtesy of a Nicky Soolsma header, and we must have been thinking to ourselves, OK, good, now to really take these guys to the cleaners. Except Pascoe Vale didn't stack the defence after that shaky start, and decided that they would instead try and win this game.

The first goal we conceded was bad enough, but what happened with the second? Why did Holmes have his arms out so far? Was he calling for offside? Was he playing for a foul? Either way, hands shouldn't be out there, right call was made, and we're 2-1 down. Gavalas isn't the best penalty saver in the world, but he made the right choice this time - but Ferrante's spot kick was well placed.

But at least we went into half time level. After several close calls - including one that hit the back post from long range from Holmes, who just can't take a trick - Luke Hopper continued his rich vein of form, by opening up the angle, shooting, and getting what looked like a deflection past Sardelic in goal.

Speaking of Sardelic, I thought he did quite well for the most part, but my goodness his kicking is still dire, especially his drop punts.

But back to Hopper again, isn't it amazing what happens when you have two up front, so you don't have the situation where a lone forward is swamped by defenders, and they are able to find space to shoot? When was the last time we did that on a consistent basis?

I know I complain about Soolsma not using his left foot, but maybe it doesn't matter if he's going to put in good cross after good cross with his right foot. For our third and decisive goal, he destroyed the Pascoe Vale defender with his fancy footwork, even though surely everyone knew where Soolsma wanted go, before putting the cross right on top of Rixon's head, the latter guiding it home for his sixth of the season.

But again, credit to the visitors who kept coming, who unfortunately just couldn't beat the offside trap. Except for that time where they did, courtesy of a howler of a non-call from the assistant referee on the far side, when it seemed completely obvious that the Pascoe Vale player was at least five metres offside RIGHT IN FRONT OF SAID LINESPERSON.

Apart from some desperate, clumsy, awkward defending from our end - which for the most part looked less desperate, clumsy and awkward than the last few weeks, though that's not necessarily saying much - I felt Pascoe Vale's best chance would come from a free kick near goal, with Michael Ferrante alway a dangerous proposition from that range. He got one shot at it, but sent the shot just wide, and I think we all breathed a little easier after that.

Chris Taylor seems to really hate making substitutions, Only one was made yesterday, Kearney on for Holmes, and that was very late on in proceedings. Usually a coach will make at least a couple, and with enough time for them to make an impact. Gus Tsolakis often his subs way too late for my lining, while Johnny A's were so predictable that they showed no initiative. Taylor either doesn't trust his bench, or doesn't see the need to change what he sees as his preferred starting eleven unless absolutely necessary.

The refereeing started off poor and went downhill from there. We probably copped the rough end of the stick for the most part, but Brian Bran may be counting himself lucky after an incident in the six yard box towards the end of the game. Our (and Trent's) old friend Milardovic got sent off late, not quite sure what for.

So another week where we made life very hard for ourselves. But also another week where we managed to get three points despite that. It did make me wonder if there could be such a thing as a season with too much entertainment, where you would wish that we could just have a dour 1-0 or 2-0 win.

So, without wanting to look too far ahead into the future, here's where we are at. We're still nine points behind first placed Northcote, so I guess we can rule out reaching their mark. We're six points (and two goals) behind second placed Melbourne Knights, who we play this week. We're two points behind third placed Port Melbourne (level on goal difference), so the double chance is still well in play. We're level on points with fourth placed Bentleigh Greens, (but five goals behind).

We're three points ahead of sixth placed Green Gully, who still have a game in hand. And we're also three points ahead of Hume City, who have an atrocious goal difference. Even with their game in hand each, you can probably discount Oakleigh and Dandenong from the finals race, even though they are still a mathematical possibility of making it - but they're both seven points outside the five at the moment.

So, how many points do we need to make the finals? Double chance? All that will become much clearer after this week, as apart from our game, Port hosts Bentleigh on Friday night. Three wins I reckon will get us the double chance. Two wins and a draw should get us into finals. Two wins and a loss and you're dealing with goal difference. Anything less than that and you're seriously playing with fire.

Lastly, it was also good to meet several and new old faces again. Met Lefteri the security guard from Greece. Met another old bloke at the tram stop, who was also wondering why Elias Donoudis won't call us Hellas any more. Also caught up with Bill Vandermey, and finally met Jake as well, who missed the game through injury.

Steve From Broady's Under 21s Report
South Melbourne's under 21s took on Pascoe Vale at Lakeside Stadium on Sunday afternoon, at the later kick off time of 2.45PM. South kicked off and the first half was extremely uneventful with both teams making no real chances (what about when Pascoe Vale hit the crossbar? Ed.). The teams went into the half time break locked at 0-0. The second half kicked off and it took 20 minutes for the game to kick into gear when Pascoe Vale played a long ball into the area, it giving them the first real chance of the game. There was a massive scramble outside the six yard box and the Pascoe Vale number 11 managed to put the ball past three defenders on the line and the keeper to give the visitors a 1-0 lead 65 minutes in. South struggled to get into gear for the rest of the game. and three minutes from time Pascoe Vale's number 11 popped up again to score a standard goal firing past the keeper from close range to put South out of there misery. 2-0 to Pascoe Vale it finished. South Melbourne's under 21s miserable season rolls on, away to Melbourne Knights next week, hopefully we can snatch a win against our old rivals.

Steve From Broady's Canteen Report
I was at the South food van for the second last time on Sunday. It was quite an excellent souv I indulged in, and I had an epic bottle of h2o. I give South's food van a 9 out of 10 for this week. Can they crack the perfect 10 on the last home game of the season? Until then, get around it!!!!!

1.Pascoe Vale 10/10
2.Oakleigh Cannons 9.5/10
3.Hume City 8/10
4.Bentleigh Greens 7/10
5.Richmond 6.5/10
6.Northcote City 3.5/10
7.Southern Stars 2/10
8.Green Gully 1/10
9.Dandenong DQ

South food truck
•Week 1 - 4.5/10
•Week 2 - 7/10
•Week 3 - 8.5/10
•Week 4 - 5/10
•Week 5 - 5.5/10
•Week 6 - 9/10
•Week 7 - 6/10
•Week 8 - 7.5/10
•Week 9 - 8/10
•Week 10 - 9/10

Around the Grounds
Altona East vs Moreland City was our non-South soccer outlet this week. Moreland dominated the opening half, should have been two or three up at halftime, even with the disallowed goal. Second half much more even contest. Moreland had another goal disallowed, squandered several chances, but credit to East who overcame their first half malaise and scored the only goal of this contest.

Panoramic shot of Paisley Park taken during half time. Click to enlarge. Photo: Ian Syson. 
For the record, the souv was freaken awesome. That'll teach Steve from Broady to stay home to watch the Wallabies lose, WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT I'D TOLD HIM WOULD HAPPEN. Some kind of seer I am predicting that result, eh?

I Re-Tweet, Therefore I Am
Congratulations to Steve from Broady who finally learned how to retweet on Twitter. You can follow him at @stevorch.

NPLV Latest
Would have loved to be in the courtroom to see this part of the action kick off, but alas, a different kind of duty called. We tried to line up a guest court reporter appearance from one of our readers, but sadly we couldn't make it work. According to 'Mahony' on the 442 forums, next court date is September 23, a week before the successful NPLV bids are announced.

Next Week
Knights away.

Final Thought
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Sunday, 28 February 2010

First point there in six years - Altona Magic 1 South Melbourne 1

A failed clearance from a corner gave Altona the lead - an undeserved one, as up to that point we were the better team. The 2nd half saw gradual improvement, and we managed to get some reward late on for our efforts when defensive confusion in the Altona defense gave substitute Fernando De Moreas the chance to score - and he did, after rounding Tommi Tommich, who had a solid game as you'd expetc now hat he wasn't in a South uniform. A point more than we've got there the previous 5 years. Rama was caught drifting towards the middle too often, while Rhodri Payne had a very solid game at left back. The new players showed glimpses of what we'll be capable of this year, but I'm not sold on this only one man up front business. Bentleigh at home next week.
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Saturday, 22 August 2009

Thanks for the peanuts, but seriously

Or how the global financial crisis is hitting Green Gully fans hard.

I was at Altona East today, and after watching two lacklustre games, I figured that I've got my media pass with me, why not watch the qualifying final next door between Altona Magic and Green Gully?

Not a bad crowd considering the small fanbases these two clubs have, as well as the complete irrelevance of this competition to everyone. Some interested onlookers included South assistant coach Phil Peladrinos, two game senior veteran Stefaan Sardelic, spanakopita heir/Heidelberg coach George Katsakis, and remakarbly, even FFV CEO Mark Rendell.

The game being a 6 goal, extra time, penalty shoot out thriller had its moments, but you can read about those elsewhere. What those match reports won't tell you is about how hard Green Gully's fans are doing it in this difficult economic climate. The stimulus packages don't seem to have trickled down to Green Gully Reserve though.

The reason I say this is because rather than purchase any food or drink from the venue - and Altona Magic is one of the cheapest canteens in the VPL - the Gully fans, a whole swathe of them, came prepared with everything they needed. Thermoses full of coffee, a sugar box, paper cups, biscuits, scones. Even the peanut/pumpkin seed man got the short end of the stick, as Gully's fans had even brought their own peanuts (which admittedly some of which they offered me).

My thinking on these matters has always been that either you buy food or drink at the ground, or you take care of all that business before the game and discreetly. The flaunting of their refusal to partake of the local delicacies was most intriguing, and gives one wild ideas about going absolutely nuts with the idea: Clarendon Corner bake sale fundraiser at Green Gully next year?
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Saturday, 8 August 2009

Lousy beyond your wildest imagination - Magic 3 Some team posing as the great South Melbourne Hellas 0

Poor. Quite poor. Abysmal. I could become a walking thesaurus but what's the point? The future as I type this is no longer entirely in our hands. We're now dependant not only on other teams doing us favours, but even worse, doing ourselves one by beating a team not in the bottom three.

There was little zip, pep, energy, maybe one shot on target, a lot of Joel Bowden, to Deledio back to Bowden defensive 50 kick to kick rubbish and far too much of can't score a goal from your own innovation, here have one on the house, and another because I like the cut of your jib.

At least the under 21s won 4-0. With some sort of miracle they could yet win the title, being equal first but with Heidelberg still to play a couple of games and our boys just one. At least there was evidence of players that could shoot, pass, run etc.
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Monday, 24 November 2008

Corporate Games 2008 wrap up

Saturday

It's a good thing I live near Paisley Park so I don't have to rush to the other side of town for an 8am start. On arrival, we find the Altona Magic side has one pitch unmarked and the venue unattended, while the Altona East side is all marked, has canteen open, and seems to be more up for it in general. Teams start arriving and we manage to sort through them without too much trouble. And then it starts. Referees start refusing to play on the unmarked ground, and then after a few serious injuries both typical and atypical football-wise, it gets to the stage where even the small East ground is deemed unplayable. So we have to squeeze four games which are meant to be played simultaneously into two grounds. This means that the 30 minute games which the teams have paid for are now reduced to 15 minute games.

I see a couple of South fans who are playing. One of their teams gets through comfortably, while the other is unlucky to miss out after losing their final game to a well hit freekick. Michael Curcija plays for one of the teams today, but his side is pretty disappointing. The weather seemed to ease up at one stage, only for it to deteriotate once more. Altona East's chicken skewer things really hit the spot, as did the putting on the lights for the final game of the day. All in all, considering all the nuisances we had to put up with, the day ended up ok, but a lot of that had to do with the way almost all the teams took the changes in their stride with nary a complaint.

Sunday

Albert Park the venue for the 6-a-side games. The grounds are a mess, and we're starting earlier. But it's generally running on time, and I'm thinking, ok, I'll be tired by the end, but will finish up here roundabout whenever I'm supposed to. But then things deteriorate steadily. The radio airwaves are clogged up with nonsense. My corresponding pitch marshal on the field next to me disappears every now and again. There are not enough bibs to go around for team clashes. Calls for medics, questions etc go unanswered. I'm not sure what's going on at venue control hq, and by the time the finals come about, I don't know where I'm supposed to send two teams who are waiting on the sidelines waiting for information their seeding. I'm tired. feeling sick, I help take down some nets, and resolve never to do this again. Once again the teams take it in their stride, the referees do the best they can, and most of the volunteers do the best they can in a bad situation. But I'm done with this. Too many teams and not enough time, and far too little pay for the hours and work we're supposed to do.
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Tuesday, 29 April 2008

Well that sucked - Altona Magic 1 South Melbourne 0

We had more opportunities, played the better football for the majority of the match, and yet still cop the loss, thanks to an own goal. But still more or less the same problems persist. Long balls from the back. Can't keep a clean sheet. Can't hit crosses above knee height. Can barely score against teams which aren't in the relegation zone. Will the transfer window opening up help? Am I overreacting seeing as actually we were the better team, and perhaps we were just unlucky? But we are in general playing a lot better than under Johnny A', and anyone who thunk otherwise is only looking at results and not the games themselves. Anyway, tough ask against Richmond this week Sunday at home, we'll see how we do.
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