R10 vs Roar Saturday 5:30pm

I don't think anyone had mentioned it, but the carols at half time were fantastic. Best half time entertainment we've had in a long long time.

Think's it's only the 3rd home game I've missed on location. Had an important Xmas thing to go to, but couldn't believe the interest watching on TV where I was. Mainly cricket and rugby people, but they love the way we're trying to play, and genuinely into it. There will be no-one more distressed tonight than Brockie. The miss was always going to put us on the backfoot. Don't blame Cunningham for pulling a swift one to try and rev the whole side up. Ref balanced that out anyway. Love what we're trying to do, and never have we looked like we can win at home and away every week like we do now. I'll rollout the tape now - "we're 2 Aussie midfield quality A League players short of being a great side"       

Moss seemed poorly positioned and moved late. I would have thought it was a strike many keepers would have got. Someone above said he didn't see it. hard to see why- the guy was shaping to shoot.

You can't win them all...

Would be nice to win one though.

Supporting this football team draws out emotions in me I didn't know I had.

• Brockie
• Absent for large parts of the game as per usual, but once he starts missing easy chances you have to seriously question his place in the side
• Key stat – 16 touches in 68 minutes
• Huysegems
• Involved in most of our good build play; picked up good positions; dropped off defenders intelligently to create shooting opportunities; fantastic dummy down the right flank
• Key stat – 7 shots with 4 on target (most in team)
• Hernandez
• Made some really poor decisions while in possession of the ball in the final third by either shooting instead of passing or choosing the wrong passing option
• Key stat – passing accuracy of 71%
• Cunningham
• Fantastic work rate defensively; gives us something different with his speed and willingness to run at defenders, but needs to improve his passing
• Key stat – 6 successful dribbles (Huysegems next with 2)
• Lia/Riera
• Couple of great through balls from both players; much better positioning than last week which gave us more defensive stability; possibly our best display yet from a holding midfield pair
• Key stat – 54 passes made by Riera (most in team) and Lia second in scoring assists with 3
• Fenton
• Better defensively; continues to look good going forward; needs to improve his final ball
• Key stat – won 100% of aerial duels and 82.4% of all duels (best of the back four)
• Sigmund/Durante
• Both defended well in general play, but that is twice in two weeks Sigmund has failed to clear from set pieces
• Key stat – passing accuracy of 55% for Sigmund

We dominated the first half until we conceded and created the better chances in the game. Our front four needs to step up. Poor finishing (Brockie and Ifill) and poor decisions in the final third (Huysegems and Hernandez) let us down badly. We should stop playing through balls down the middle as we just don’t have enough pace, but we should continue to play them down the flanks as they seem to be a lot more successful. Average second half performance and our lack of fitness showed as we struggled to get forward as a team in the last 20 minutes.

• Team Stats (Phoenix vs. Brisbane)
• Total shots – 20 vs. 13
• Possession – 40% vs. 60%
• Passing accuracy – 69% vs. 78%
• Passing accuracy (opposition half) – 61% vs. 75%

Possible changes for next week: Hicks/Ifill for Brockie and maybe Boxall for Sigmund.

Sorry, but I'm a bit skeptical about this dreamed-of promised land of future superior players.

Where are they going to come from? Ernie's already cleared-out several e.g. for fullbacks we now have Reece Caira and Louis Fenton, but are they really much of an improvement on what we had before in Lochhead and Bertos? I don't believe so. I think it's a shame Fenton, let's face  it one of NZ's best young attacking players, has been forced to try and play as a defender - he just doesn't have the defensive skills for the A-League, although he still looks good going forward at times. He'll never be a Roberto Carlos however as I remember Ernie bizarrely comparing him to a few months ago.

With a salary cap and an apparent reluctance on the part of the Welnix owners to pay for any big imports, instead preaching a philosophy of developing their own young players, I don't see a much stronger squad in fact arriving in the next several years. Few top Aussie players have ever shown much inclination to cross the ditch since the Phoenix arrived or before in the Kingz and Knights days (Durante in the current side - who was one of the top A-League players at Newcastle; Andy Vlahos was a class act at the Kingz and left them for the Belgian First Division where he played 59 matches for Cercle Brugge). Bigger money and the chance to play in a decent side are the only things that would motivate any decent Aussies to sign. So that's not going to happen.

We'd have to rely a lot on Aussie players to build a better side because there just aren't enough Kiwis of the required standard, nor likely to be in the near future. Any decent young Kiwi players get signed by foreign clubs - and that won't change even with the Asia-Pacific Football Academy moving to Wellington to be aligned with the Phoenix.

The talent the Phoenix have missed out on, developed in NZ and currently at overseas clubs: Cameron Howieson, Bill Tuiloma, Ryan Thomas, Scott Basalaj, Craig Henderson, Dan Keat, Chris Wood, Tim Payne, Jesse Edge, Judd Baker, Michael O'Keefe, Jake Gleeson, Michael Fitzgerald, Birhanu Taye, Rhys Jordan.

People say Alex Rufer and Michael Ridenton have ability - and lets hope they make it at the Phoenix alongside Tyler Boyd and Luke Adams who are in the first team squad. But there aren't many other young Kiwi players knocking on the door.

Some of the Kiwis playing professionally overseas won't make it or will decide to return home for varying reasons, just as happens with the much larger number of Aussies playing overseas. And as with them, some will possibly end up in the A-League. But it won't be many. Our very best players like Winston Reid, Chris Wood and Marco Rojas will probably follow in Ryan Nelsen's footsteps and never return to play for the Phoenix. It's not enticing when the level of both pay and play is so much higher overseas.

Although Australia has a similar problem that the majority of its very best players play overseas rather than in the A-League, I feel we are more adversely affected than they are because we produce a much lower number of quality young players than they do.

A NZ side entered in Australia's top football competition would have fared better in the period roughly 1977 - 1999 before so many of our best players left to play overseas. We could have fielded virtually an All Whites team bolstered by the kind of quality imports that were affordable in those days. Imports who played in our national league in the '70's and 80's to give some idea of the quality available then: 

Paul Mariner- ex-Ipswich and England international (an Auckland club in the national League in the 1980's); Sir Trevor Brooking- ex-West Ham and England (University of Auckland in the National League in the mid-1980s); John Fashanu- later of Wimbledon, Aston Villa and England (Mirimar in 1982- played in televised Chatham cup Final); Peter Mendham- of Norwich City (Two spells with Miramar in late 70's and early 80's); Mick Channon - England, Man City, Southampton, Norwich striker (Miramar Rangers 1985 - signed by Portsmouth from Miramar)

Ricky Hill - went on to play for Watford when they were a top team in the old First Division (Christchurch United 1983);

Jonathan Gould - current Phoenix goalkeeper coach, prev. of Celtic and Scotland fame (played as a teenage centreback early in his career at Napier City Rovers and was one of the team's top-scorers in the mid-1980s);

Brian McAllister- ex-Wimbledon, Aston Villa and Scotland 1998 World Cup squad (Napier City Rovers centreback mid-1980s)

In the '70's and 80's several of the best All Whites played in the old NSL (Sumner, Woodin, Grant Turner, Wilson, Gosling, Wright, McGarry, Dods, Ironside, Herbert etc.) - but most would have returned if there was a NZ side then in the NSL. We only had a handful of Kiwis playing professionally in the UK and Europe then (Rufer, de Jong, Ceri Evans, Herbert, Declan Edge, Perry Cotton - Scunthorpe) Herbert and Edge only played a couple of years in the UK. 

Enjoyable game to watch on tv. We looked like a footballing side. Moss was poor, really poor in fact. Does not command the area, should have come from the cross. Then when he didn't he gets down like a sack of potatoes an the ball trickles past him. Second goal agree with above I think he was positioned properly the ball only went just to his right he just missed it like last week with the long range goal he conceded. Oh and his distribution was again sub par. What are our goalkeeping stocks like?

Was very surprised when they announced the crowd as 6.3k (and at basically fulltime, clearly being read off a bit of paper). Thought it looked easy over 8k and was hoping for 9k. Good work in the fever zone too peeps, very impressive stuff! Must be some sore throats this morning!

I thought the crowd looked closer to 8k. Will the 12 inch remix version of Yellow Army be available on iTunes?

Note to self: You can get sunburnt at 3-30pm. Will remember that next time I go to a curtain raiser.

Sorry Guys the one thing for me that hasn't improved...ever is the halftime entertainment, from the almost meaningless competitions to the inane chatter of wannabee presenters to the carols etc etc

How to build a winning team?  No.341: "Parlour Lifts Lid"

"I'll always remember the moment Steve Bould went up to the bar and ordered 35 pints for the 5 of us. Afrer we left the bar we spotted the French lads in the coffee shop smoking. I thought 'How are we going to win the league this year? We're all drunk and they're all smoking.' We ended up winning the double that year."

In today's StarTimes.

Singing was match highlight for me. You should record same and market it YF. Sales could be good. Too late for Xmas though.

Ifill should start (I've moved away from the bench brigade and am in the Feverish* camp on this).

*may have been Marius - woteva these Wharfies are all alike.

Hope Cunningham got a fish for diving on command ...

Brockie should be dropped for the miss.

Muscat beaten easy for the second goal

come on bevan most of us could have scored from there!

Agreed, it was as simple a chance as any player could have hoped for. He had time to let it bouce and roll off his boot and he would have scored.

The carols were cheesy and came across a bit childish at first, but those guys sang their hearts out and it was quite entertaining by the end.

I agree. Fit or not, we are more likely to score when hes on the park. From our current options, might as well play him up front with Husysegems

Once again the half time non entertainment sucked. It would be nice if they did something that wasn't in front of ailses 25 or 26 as there are fans in the other areas of the ground that like to see it too. Nixie chicks sounded good but couldnt see much. I gather they had the dancer there. As for the carols, they did the very same thing last year. Was ok but again was way over the other side. As for the ball give away for thr $1000 draw. 1 friggen ball was thrown into the crowd between aisles 8 and 19. Was there a half time competition going on at the same time as everything else? Didn't notice anything.

The brilliant news though is no music during the game, thank fuck for that. As for the YF once we equalised you guys went flat out and it reminded me of season's 1 and 2. Well done and it sounded friggen awesome over in aisle 12.

Hate being real negative but IMO this game was up there with the worst nix performances ever.

And the ref was mud and we can complain all we like but we were mud too. I don't think we would have won that game had the ref been someone else or just better

This point. Note the full stop after the word.

Why Sherminator isn't starting I don't know.... Ernie, what are you thinking ???

The difference between us and the other teams is purely this:

We get a handful of great chances to score and we don't. Other teams get a half a chance to score and they do.