1 Barba, 2 Barba, 3 Barbarouses

Don't want to get into a whole scapegoat thing but it's a mystery to me what's gone wrong with Kosta. I think an in form Kosta is a fantastic player, one of the most devastating attackers in the league and every bit as good as Burns was for us. At MV he sometimes went through odd patches of poor form, like he'd lost his confidence or something, but he would come always come back and start tearing it up.

Now he seems to be stuck in a rut. I was shocked at how bad his basic touch and simple ball control was in the Adelaide game. It was like he was a junior player trying to find his feet. Biggest challenge for the coaches is to get him back into top form quick smart. We desperately need the old MV Kosta putting the fear of god into opposition defenders. I still have high hopes he can do this so I wouldn't want to see him dropped to the bench yet.

Kosta could have a bad game at Victory and they'd still win easily. The team's form could still be good even if he was crap. That lifts a player.

We don't have that. He needs to be in good form for the team to get into form.

I think Kosta has always been an average to slightly above average player. He's quick and can pull off some good passes or tap some balls in the net but that's about it. You're also forgetting at MV he actually had decent teammates......

In that case I doubt you even watched any of his games last season. He was dynamite.

At the Victory he was getting the ball in behind the defence and could run onto it in space, his first touch isn't as big a problem then. We are giving him the ball in front of the defence, with 2-3 men to beat and he hasn't been able to do it. To me this is down to how slow we are at getting the ball through our midfield. We could have Marco back & he would suffer the same issues Kosta has been.

Much this. Our transition through midfield is quite slow, Roly in particular seems to take 4/5 touches each time he is on the ball. Kosta is best when running at, or behind, defenders who are backpedaling. Our slow movement limit those opportunities.

But having said that, Kosta also seems to be taking far to many touches and making some basic decision making errors.

Quite slow is like saying Bozza dabbled in illicit substances once !

What disappointed me on Sunday with Kosta was how poor his first touch was and the number of times he tried to beat a player and ended up coughing up the pill!

I don't know him personally but he seems a bit more insecure player and his confidence is down at the moment. I guess you have to let him play and build him up to think he is the greatest. Because if he gets his form back he can be deadly. And agree with the comments that he gets a bad service no balls behind the defence for him.

Poor service, the same for Watson too.

he is not just a in behind the defence type of player though - he setup quite a few chances with some intelligent little balls against WSW at Mt Smart (I'm sure there are other games he has been creative as well but I remember WSW as the guy next to me was calling for Kosta's head all game)

He comes across to me as the type of player who doesn't value possession vs. the potential of creating a chance for himself or someone else - probably struggles with the basics sometimes as he doesn't value it as much as the high risk stuff - just needs to work on some pass and move type stuff and the flashy stuff will start to come off more regularly.

On the plus side - he works hard on defence, has genuine pace and has A-League experience - he like others just needs a system to be stuck with and consistency of selection so combinations can be worked on.

He wasn't a marquee at Victory was he?  Why should we regard him as a marquee here.  It's just book accounting.

He looked great at Victory because they had Kahfallah at his best on the other side and Berisha in the middle.  You get an assist every second time you give it to Berisha in a half decent position and you get a goal while they are woried about Berisha and Kahfallah and you sneak in at the far post or get given the luxury of only needing to beat your own man while teh rest of them are busy  And winning most of the time and confidence are great things.

I am hoping that the combined quality of Krishna, Kosta and Smeltz will approach something like that Victory combination.  A bit of a poor man's version of it, but maybe enough.  And will lift Finkler (and the rest of the team) also.

Small things can make big differences.

(But I'm an optimistic realist).

we need more of these optimists!

here you go mate

Lol people talking about Kosta as average

No. Talking about his current form being average.

On the basis that you are much more likely to pass to your friend as someone you trust than someone you don't know so well I reckon send Krishna, Kosta, Watson and Finkler off somewhere for a week with an unlimited drinks budget and get them to play a lot of 5-a-side on the beach and do some chilling. Let Parkhouse, Smeltz, Rogerson, McGarry and Litfin fill in for the week and I reckon when they get back the combinations between the first group would be much better...

that's my football management theory!

I like your style. 

Sounds like my club's pre-season training

Kosta played better for us when we spelt misspelt his name Costa instead of Kosta!  

He has been one of the biggest disappointments for me this season.

Stealing a liVing currently

Another square peg in whatever is the Nix round hole style of play.

http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/article/2017/01/05/five-minutes-wellington-phoenix-winger-kosta-barbarouses

My three wishes would be:

To get over 20k fans at all Phoenix home games

To win the League - premiers plate and the final

To quality for Russia 2018

I doubt any of those are achievable.

That's why they are wishes Leggy!  

Definition:

wish

wɪʃ/

verb

verb: wish; 3rd person present: wishes; past tense: wished; past participle: wished; gerund or present participle: wishing

1.

feel or express a strong desire or hope for something that cannot or probably will not happen.

Mine is:

10k at all games in Wellington

Finish top 2

Have enough time to build our own stadium

Someone is taking the piss!  "Kosta Player Of The Year"

As much as I like Kosta, the reality is that he hasn't delivered what he is capable of as per his time at the Victory.

They must have handed out the wrong envelope

It's almost like one of those Encouragement awards you get as a kid..

But in all honesty who has performed as well as they should this season. Can't say anyone in the front 2/3rds impressed above expectations.

Tratt and or Rossi.

I think he meant mids/forwards. I'd say Lia, Krishna and A-Rod count though (I know, some people will disagree on A-Rod)

Yea I mean any one apart from defenders/keepers. Tratt Rossi and Doyle all impressed. But in the front I dont think any one performed better than we thought they would. A-rod was solid and Krishna was good by his own standards.

Kosta put in energy all season, but only started to produce quality and results towards the end. It's his first year back at the club. Remember what Krishna achieved in his first year with us? One start and a lot of headless chicken running IIRC. Certainly didn't impress the fever faithful with his first efforts. 

That was Krishna's first year as a professional, Kosta came to us as one of the top players in the comp, our marquee, and a key member of a squad that won the toilet seat.

What is quite telling is that despite Kosta being the marquee of the team Krishna is the one who is in most of the advertising. 

Kosta isn't a striker - he is really more of a winger. I have seen him score some great goals and produce moments where you go "he's a quality player." The truth is that he doesn't produce those moments consistently. He produces them enough to be a very good a-league player but not enough to lead an attack by himself. Martinez, Castro, Ninkovic, Rojas and Troisi are all attacking midfielders who are going to get score ten goals a season, provide heaps of assists and lead an attack by themselves. 

Barbarouses has 95 a-league games for 20 goals and wasn't even a prolific scorer for Team Wellington. He simply isn't a ten goals a season type of player. He will get assists but not heaps of them. You can't put Barbarouses in a poor team and suddenly have a good team like you could do with other a-league players.

The point is that Kosta isn't a player to build a team around. He is simply a cog in a midfield unit. The problem this season is that Barbarouses wasn't playing in a fully functioning midfield. Our defensive midfielders were poor and he didn't have a striker to play around. I think if we sign a striker and a defensive midfielder then Kosta will be a lot better because he can just do his role.

The same goes for Finkler. He was never a player who was going to win you a league single handedly. He was simply a good player who will perform well if you put complimentary players around him.

Ended up coming 5th in the Johnny Warren Award voting

Gee thats pretty impressive for someone who underperformed by his own standards.

Finishing ahead of Rojas is pretty insane.

Wellington Phoenix agree to release Barbarouses from last year of contract

After much consideration Wellington Phoenix have consented to the release of Kosta Barbarouses.

Following a difficult twelve months off the field, the All White striker approached Phoenix management asking for a release for reasons not pertaining to football.

Wellington GM David Dome was initially disappointed but said that he understood Barbarouses’ position.

“It’s not a decision we have made lightly,” said Dome, “especially after the back end to the season that Kosta had.”

“But it’s never been our policy as a club to stand in the way of a player’s happiness, or the happiness of those dear to him, and as much as we could have dug our heels in, the best thing for all parties concerned is an amicable termination.

“Obviously it’s disappointing to lose a player of Kosta’s pedigree – he’s exactly the type of character we want to attract to this football club. But every door closing is a door opening and we remain confident the squad we are currently assembling will have Wellington very much in the mix for finals football.”

Kosta departs with the very best wishes of everyone at the football club, and Wellington Phoenix would like to place on record their gratitude for his professional attitude and demeanour both on and off the field and pay tribute to his work within the community.

For Barbarouses, it was a position reached after considerable reflection.

“Wellington Phoenix gave me my first start in professional football’, said Barbarouses, “there are so many people at this club that I am especially grateful to, and I guess that’s something that’s made this decision a lot harder.”

“People forget sometimes that there are more factors involved than just football. Behind every player are a lot of people making sacrifices – I’ve been fortunate to enjoy tremendous support, so sometimes you have to think about others and consider their needs.

“I came home wanting to win a championship for Wellington and New Zealand but obviously that hasn’t happened. It’s frustrating it hasn’t all come together for me at this time, but you never know what’s round the corner in football – maybe under better circumstances we still can.”

Kosta Barbarouses made 25 appearances and scored five goals in his second spell with the club, and had one year left to run on his two-year contract with Wellington Phoenix.