R1 vs Perth Glory | Sunday 12th Oct | 5pm | RoF

I agree. We were horribly narrow and it was horrible to watch for the most part.

Guessing that was when they played Canterbury United instead perhaps? Or it might have been the week the All Whites were away?

but how can Brockie be so consistently shit , and still have all the goes rather than Krishna?

To me Brockie aint a footballer. He can score a great goal now and then if the ball falls near him and hes facing the right way.

There is plenty of angst here for our defence, which is fair enough, but it wasn't the defence that disappointed me on Sunday, it was our shape and threat (or lack of it) going forward. Ive seen sides play at home with next to no defence - they spent all day attacking. We again looked like the away team on Sunday for me.

my memory of this conversation is a little hazy...

Consistently sh*t = golden boot contender? 

I'm willing to give him a go this year. Yes, he wasn't very good at all last season. But it was off the back of a good season (goals wise) where he contended for the golden boot and then he went to Toronto in the offseason which I'm willing to use as an excuse for his poor season IF he proves it with some good performances this season. 

Having had a few days to forget about what I saw live, I just watched the TV coverage and I am far more optimistic than I was at 7pm on Sunday.

Between the 5th minute and Perth's first goal we were absolutely on top and should have scored twice at least. It does raise the spectre of the Not A Striker meme, but we will score plenty of goals this season if we can consistently create that many chances. Apart from the mistakes for the two goals, I think we defended fairly well, and through Doyle cost us a goal, he made two or three absolutely key interventions. He will learn from the mistakes, I am sure. However, Siggy probably shouldn't be trying to split two players with his passes. People have complained about Wee Mac not crossing from the left, but he often had no one to cross to, or no space to do it in. He can after all use his left foot. Finally, though we were ponderous at times, when we got the tempo up we looked really good.

One concern though. In preseason I heard Ernie talk about how he always wants at least four men getting into the box, but it was almost always only two or maybe three. I think that held up our attacks as much as anything.

In the end we had more shots, more shots on target, better shot accuracy (shots/shots on target - blocked shots), won more duels, had better passing and cross accuracies, and won a higher percentage of our tackles. Possession was almost exactly 50/50. The one stat that concerns me is how much better Perth were in the air (they won aerial duels 60% of the time). Sauce.

I see the McGlinchey opener and for once in the last 27 games, we had a later runner into the box (and we lamented all last year that we were missing Tim Brown for that very skill) and slotted it. Burns got down, there was a runner, another and I think there were 3 players in the box and I actually said to myself 'that's how an attack works'. Last year we could not do that at all. That spell you talk about from about 10 mins on in the 1st half was amazing to watch. The pieces are there, the execution is kinda there, its just needs a bit of chemistry now. That comes with time on the park. You can run 6 up Canty but judging by that, its seems not to be not too difficult a task considering the difference in leagues. Against actual resistance.....

I am optimistic.

The goal is definitely a good example of Ernie's rule about getting bodies into the box, and when we were pushing for the winner we were getting three men in there consistently. Unfortunately, even then the rest of the team was miles back. On one occasion we had Brockie, Wee Mac, and Roly get into the box for a Burns cross, and when the ball was cleared you could see that Gorrin, the next-closest Nix player was only on the edge of the centre circle. I think that we may have had a different result if he had simply gotten forward more in support. Ernie may be tentative about leaving only one midfielder back after our defensive woes last season, but I think that it was his one possible real tactical failing in this game.

Just had this game recorded and thought I'd put it on in the background while I did some chores this morning. Funnily enough, it's completely changed my take on the game, as others said above. Perth should have been a man down, but even without that we actually played some delicious football. 

I wonder what it was about seeing it live that made us all so negative?

Like I said. Prepare to get pilloried....

I am just going to post my smugness in saying that I didn't need to look at a replay to come to that viewpoint.

Still think we need a bit more thinking when attacking.

Fair enough.

I think for me personally it was just that bombing goal-scoring chances and giving up soft goals made me too pissy to appreciate the bits of the game where we weren't bombing chances or conceding soft goals.

I guess that's why I was so high horse about the angst after 1 game. It was not the terrible performance people made it out to be.

lol

The only trouble with that is that Merrick has said time and time again that he likes his teams to play narrowly

Yeah, I agree. I cant say I like the shape of the team as its playing. Way too narrow for my liking, its not good to watch even if they end up being successful