Match 5 vs Sydney FC | Mon 8th Feb | 9:10pm | SS7

I'm starting to get a sinking feeling about Hemed. An 18 yr old kid from the Mariners has 5 goals on him already and looks infinitely more dangerous. For Talay to pull his import striker at half time and not even replace him with another striker says a lot. Pretty humiliating for Hemed I imagine.

As well as we played overall it's looking very much like the post-covid latter days of last season when we couldn't convert a multitude of chances and then consistently got picked off on the break.

Sorta. You can see his play and movement is a higher quality in the A-League, but a lot like what happened with previous English strikers (a la Sheridan) - we don't play to their strengths. He gets very little service and the players don't see to have an understanding with him. The times we do look for Hemed, it's just a hoof and hope into the box, usually when he's surrounded by 3 defenders. We have to play to our players strengths and we rarely do that. For example, Da Vila & Lewis are CAM's, Ball is a striker - yet we've played them all on the wing.

agreed, the service to Hemed is currently not what he needs, he gets himself in some great positions but the ball is passed behind him or not at all. Some of our decision making up front is poor which is resulting in rushed shots. 

As above, I think Davila particularly is being played out of position, he was way more effective for us when he was playing centrally. If we are gonna pdersist with the 4-2-3-1 shape with Hemed up top them Davila needs to be the CAM with Ball/Sotirio and Piscopo out wide. Otherwise we change things up and with one less DM and have two up front with 3 attacking mids allowing Ball and Hemed to play up front together. I think on his own, Hemed is easy to mark out of the game, and with Davila out wide there is noone in the middle creating play. 

I think the good thing is that our attack definitely has the ability and I do believe it will come right. Davila in particular when he comes centrally has the ability to change games, his shooting was well off last night but it will get there. Piscopo was very positive when he came on as well and definitely tried to make things happen.

I'm still very concerned about our defense though. De Vere was excellent last year alongside another experienced CB in Taylor, but at the moment I think him and Laws don't work together. Both are susceptible to pace and seem easily flustered.

He was clearly protecting the near post and took a punt that Kosta will fire a cross instead. My impression from the footage was that Kosta's first goal was more speculative than well aimed. Few inches to the left and the shot could have probably came off the far post for a tap in or a clearance.

yeah I dont think de Vere is managing being the senior leader in the backs that well. He doesnt appear to be filling the Taylor role at all ie vocally leading the troops around. Besides the fact he seems to be getting caught way too high up the pitch.

Marinovic for the scapegoat role??

I'm not sure he can be blamed solely for either goal. First one he maybe could have stretched a bit further and tipped it wide, but he was protecting the near post and Kosta got lucky. An inch to the left and it ounces out instead of in. Second goal was a decent shot and was past marinovic before he'd even leapt. Defense have left him on his own too often this season. I', not sure if TAHW is quicker or more agile than de Vere or Laws, which could be an issue going forward.

Talay says Hemed came off at HT, after experiencing some tightness.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/a-league/124168043/kosta-barbarouses-scores-twice-to-beat-former-club-wellington-phoenix

Interesting stat for me, is 4 teams above Nix on the table with the same (-2 GD) or worse GD. All 4 have played more games than the Nix.

Still early days, and I'd favour a win in the Gong over CCM, esp if Devlin is good to go.

Two major concerns now - Defence - We seem slow. Is THW any quicker or for that matter McGing? Centrally, we seem to be missing Taylor, but was he any quicker? So what has changed or have other teams worked us out? On the positive side Fenton made a big impact when he came on. Attack - Initially I believed we had done well with the height and experience of Hemed. But I’m becoming a doubter. In all of the games so far, we could have been 2 ahead at the break, but we haven’t been and we’ve gone on lose or draw, except for one brief moment from Rufer and Sotirio ( who is now out for 6 weeks). It is the prime responsibility of the CF Striker to score, only it hasn’t happened. Who is going to score next Sunday? Can we win at WIN stadium?

For me the issue is the defence.  We've looked pretty vulnerable in each game now even when dominating, and when we're only losing by the odd goal good defending can turn losses into draws and draws into wins.  Laws and De vere is just a massive step down from De vere and Taylor.  I'm also a big fan of McGarry but so far is defending looks a bit lightweight.  I think we will score goals but if we keep conceding we will stay where we are.

Yeh- another year and one is enough, and maybe we score more as it opens up. But lets be honest- the midfield and attack are also vulnerable. Losing Devlin and not having Piscopo or Sotirio leaves us short.

If the Strikers are having to drop deep to get the ball, having balls passed behind them, having the ball lobbed into the box in the hope that someone will get a head on it, etc, they're not going to score unless they're good enough to dribble several players (I can't think of a player in the A-league who can do that) or we hit them on the break with pace. 

Sotirio is the prime player for the latter, but we rarely use his pace to our advantage or we over hit passes. 

Hemed is a strong player and finisher. He links up with players (see DaVila's goal last week) and will get on the end of crosses. The issue we're having with him is we're rarely playing the ball to feet or when we do (smiliarily to when we hoof it into the box), he's surrounded by players. If we're going to criticise him for not scoring, we should be doing the same for Ball.

Our lack of goal scoring isn't down to individual players - it's down to how the team is playing - tactics and decision making.

I haven't watched much this season, so this is just a general comment - but any forward at any serious level of football is generally surrounded by opposition defenders. No-one willingly defends purely 1-on-1 in the box, especially in the central area, and part of the forward's skillset is to find space or an angle where he can take a decisive touch despite having defenders around him.

As I said, I'm not linking the above comment specifically to Hemed as I haven't seen enough, but what I did see in the first couple of games was that his off the ball movement and first touch were below the level I'd have expected from someone of his type of pedigree. Admittedly it was very early in the season and his first serious football in a long while, so it could have been just rustiness.

Not sure we can say Hemed's a strong finisher when he hasn't finished anything yet. He wasn't good last night but fair enough, if he he had a niggle then we can hardly get on his case. 

I guess overall I have been just a bit disappointed in his first touch and his ability to protect the ball under pressure. Might be unfair to compare him with Fornaroli who is fantastic in both these departments, but he is our import striker and we need him to show a lot more than your average home grown A League player. 

As for Ball, he has a incredible workrate which is essential for us, but he is not an out and out striker. If Hemed doesn't step up, or Talay can't find the right tactical set up to get him more involved in front of goal then we will struggle to win games.

I think Hemed has failed to take the opportunity to wow us, but, like Hooper he has time to do so. The rest of the team need to make it easier for him though. Currently it too easy to double up on Hemed and Davila cos they are the only apparent threats. Add Piscopo into the mix and he will drag defenders wide giving both Davila and Hemed more space in the middle, hopefully then we'll see some of those chances getting finished.

A lot of it is coming down to millimetres, if you look at Sydney's first goal it was against the run of play and was a ball that hit the post and bounced in, we had three potential goals hit the post or crossbar and bounce out. If one of our post hits goes in or their post hit bounces out then the game could be quite different.

yep, if our two cross bar hits had gone in last night then we'd be talking about a 3-2 win.

We've scored in every game so far, and haven't lost by more than a one-goal margin. We could be playing a lot worse.

Shooting practice essential, the boys are trying to hit the cover off the ball instead of concentrating on timing and placement....... muratovic looks all over the place doesn't seem to have any game awareness, would rather see Waine getting those minutes. 

Hemed looks to be getting desperate, gives away silly fouls and just cant get involved, needs a goal badly!

Would have been good to see Rufer or Ridenton pushing on a little bit to create more up front but I guess they are worried about exposing our back four when we turn the ball over.

Piscopo added plenty of spark, God I hope devlin's ok.

Hemed needs someone playing closer to him to help take defenders away. He's getting swamped because he's the only player we have centrally as we go with the two wider players playing up top.

Our formation is not working. 

Davilla needs to play more central... not sure how we do this without say moving to more of a 5 - 3 - 2 formation with Davila playing at the top of the midfield. Having the extra CD might help with us getting caught on the counter as we are not being hit out wide but through the middle.

Sherian was not English. And still isn't.

dont need 5 at the back to move Davila central.

play 4-1-3-2 and he can play centrally with piscopo and lewis on the wings with Ball and Hemed up front.

My point exactly. It would be hard for any keeper to do much about the first goal. In contrast, in the frame of the camera footage, you can see DeVere being relatively near the far post with no opposing player bothering him - but nobody blames Devere for not defending the far post.  

It's a combination of bad luck and quite patchy defending.  Not particularly terrible throughout, just not consistent enough..

Uffie is right in that players need to look at the level Uli is showing them, e.g. when he shoots, he mostly hits it along the ground to go inside one post or the other, not just blasting it as hard as possible.

These are skills that should have been  taught in junior football, not waiting until you are a pro.

Tim Brown! No one could beat Sydney with a ball pearolling past a keeper better.

This Point Martin. Tim had the wood on them.

Who can forget his lobbed goal over Liam Reddy from halfway.

If we don't start converting chances into goals, surely we are the favorite for wooden spoon!

Can TAHW please start now instead of Laws. Laws is a quality player, but his inexperience at CB is starting to hurt us.

this season is so tight. There are worse teams than us I believe, but teams like Victory and City are probably better than what their current standing suggests.

If Devlin is out injured. Maybe Talay should put TAHW in at CB and Laws as left DM.

Fair. That comment was meant to say "English League strikers" - implying Championship/League 1/2 etc.

Dont really think you can judge  properly how good his off the ball work is from watching on TV. Think you  can only get get a better idea of that from watching live. Think he has shown from some of his touches if we can get our delivery right he can add value.  Still dont get why Sheridan is used as example way over rated by many. 

comparing Sheridan to Hemed is daft, two very different players bought to the club to do different jobs. Sheridan came here on a short term contract, he barely saw any game time, although when he came on he often made an impact- we never really saw his full potential.

Hemed is here for a full season, at least, he has already shown his potential, just need him to click with the rest of the squad and hopefully we will see some goals.

Got to feel for the Nix. We have been playing brilliant football most of the time, its always just our cutting edge up front.

2018/19 - After Round 6, we started being more clinical in front of goal (2-1, 0-0, 0-3, 0-2, 1-3, 1-1, 3-1)

2019/20 - After Round 7, we started being more clinical in front of goal (0-1, 1-2, 1-2, 2-3, 1-1, 2-1, 2-1)

2020/21 - ???

I blame Payne for the second goal, going down to get the ball, sure Kosta was gone. Speaking of Payne, his crossing is also not very good. I wish Uffi would play Fenton down that line, he always adds something when coming on.