R2 vs Perth Glory | Sun 16 Oct | 9:00pm | SS2

football is the real word ,its the rest that's a nightmare !

Also even with the injection of new players I think that the rump of the squad has become accustomed to losing. It's quite evident in the here-we-go-again body language of the long termers when we concede a goal. Constant failure can really undermine the morale of a team. We don't seem to have anyone who can lift the team with a bit of magic or mongrel. The team just quietly dissolves, the game meanders to it's inevitable conclusion and the season falls away yet again.

I can understand as it's a different day but the same 'ol shark

Wonder how these first couple of performances are going to affect the attendance metrics for next week... 

I remember seeing a tweet when we beat City 4-1 a few weeks back posturing for the start of the seson to kick off already. Sadly I don't see enough quality for our season to get going in a positive direction any time soon. Still left wondering when we're taking our on field performances to the #NixLevel. It's been pretty abject so far.

I'd be more worried about what the attendance metrics will be after the Sydney game

Genuine LOLZ

At some point, Ernie needs to shake it up and the 1st victim is Roly. A swap of him for A-Rod may give the side a better shape as A-Rod is more of a passer and box to box. Roly likes to dribble with it and if he is going to play in the midfield, I want him to be more of a conduit shuffling the ball on.

I was hoping to see Rufer, he came off the bench really well last week and Merick always said "train well and you get on the bench, play well off the bench and you get the start".

why cant we have fox at right back, doyle left back and rodriguez cdm. 

Riera in a very unglamourous and workman like way held that midfield together and saved Vinnies bacon on many an occasion with his short passing and tackling,he was much more significant than people  realise cleaning up many a mess in the middle and winning the fifty fifty scraps!Ramon Tribulietx knows this at Auckland city even if our current manager doesn't! 

having gui as a false nine does not work, kosta and roy playing on the wing with no one in the box makes no sense 

It's self-perpetuating: when you fail and fail again the will to fight becomes less and less. Think back just two seasons when Roly was an absolute monster in midfield. It was fantastic seeing him want to take the game by the scruff of the neck every week and generally managing to do it. Nowadays he just seems to let the latest failure wash over him. And I'm not even singling him out either - it seems to run through the whole team.

Anyway, I'm depressing myself typing this shark. Next week we'll probably win 4-0!

I didn't say he was released but I wonder how much actual energy was put into getting him to stay,my point is that he is sorely missed in the midfield especially when Rolly doesn't get out of bed for his wages!

Ernie was surprised when Riera asked for the release and tried to convince him to stay. But Riera felt that he wouldn't stay fit for a season and would let the team down so decided to walk. Or so the story goes.

The fekin metrics will be okay next week,loads of advertising and free tickets for a million bored kids plus its a public holiday on the Monday,doesnt solve the real issues on the park though!

It's a tough start to the season and now we have Sydney and Melbourne Victory coming up. We need to nab some points early on..

People are going to say "it is only the second game." However, we are seeing the team line up the same way and make the same mistakes. Merrick has also seemed a bit naive in the way he has compiled his squads. I'm not going to write the team off at this stage but I think we are very much lacking in key positions.

I really don't give  a monkeys chuff "how the story goes"I do understand that and if I'm being honest with myself he was starting to look slightly jaded ,but we do need a midfielder with a similar style, if nothing else its  a simple belt and braces insurance policy a fix it player ,a clean up man for when Vinnie and Rolly are being charitable with  tackling and passing or in Rolly's case simply holding on to the ball for too long!

I don't think Finkler was really the type of attacking player we needed. We already had a creative central passerin McGlinchey (albeit in poor form last season) and Bonevacia. 

Finkler seems to slow the play down when he gets it. The only real quality I think he'll add to to the side is his set-piece delivery. A proper holding midfielder (Riera replacement) or a quality striker would have been a better use of funds. 

But I'll give Merrick the benefit of the doubt. I think he can get them playing well in the next 2 or 3 games. 

I agree fully, losing seems like it's become part of our culture. We have a loser's mentality. Even as a fan watching, in the first 15 minutes I was thinking 'Wow we're performing well, we're probably going to concede a cheap goal though.' We don't seem to have that spirit to us, we've conformed to the same shark, same smell mentality when we go a goal down. 

Not sure I can be that bothered but I guess Ill make a few comments.

• Thank heaven for the ref, else we would have been the worst ones out there
• Neither were pens, the first was an accidental clip from Parkhouse and in the second Moss clearly pushes the ball sideways. Sigh.
• Barbarouses, well , not his best game was it.
• McGlinchy, next to non existent
• Roly, hardly better than last week
• Finkler, even his free kicks were moderate this week
• We are still playing the horrible predictable narrow shape
• my boy said, dad, whats a "Phoenix Nil" ?
• did Rodrigues come on? If so , why?

Rufer in for Lia, A-Rod for Roly, based on those two games.

Lia just doesn't have the pace, or the discipline. 

And A-Rod just has better situational awareness and less ego than Roly.

If Roly plays he needs to be closer to goal

I have been following the Phoenix for years even here in Aus but each year I am finding it harder and harder to even want to watch the games.  Why must we stick with Ernie?  Why not be a bit ruthless and shake things up?  Rather than give up on this season so early?

We do have quality in the team but I honestly think you would need to be a very good coach to get something out of this squad. We are lacking a central striker. Barbarouses is a very good player but only scored 15 goals in 70 appearances for Victory. Krishna also has some great attributes but isn't a traditional centre forward. Hamish Watson is a traditional centre forward but isn't quite up to the level. 

Then you have Finkler/Bonevacia who both take up significant money and a foreign spot but play the same position. We can't find a spot for A-Rod as he competes with McGlinchey. Unfortunately, due to Riera leaving we are stuck with Lia as a defensive midfielder. Then we have Tratt and Parkhouse as wing backs.

We do have good players but I don't see how we have a cohesive squad. Our players don't seem to complement each other.

New Year, same old shark...expect half the crowd @ the season opener next week at the stadium...

Why because, 0-2 to start the season, public holiday, the wind and the rain and the way the Phoenix are playing...are not exactly a great invite to go to the game next week...

Guess we have to continue to fall in to the ashes first, in order to rise from them...

Greenacre was a useful forward and a great team guy who performed well if workman-like for a very different Nix in a somewhat lower quality A-League several seasons ago. Since then, the quality of new players (including imports) that have made A-League their home means that any less-than-average coaching quality will be quickly exposed and punished by the opposition. Just look at Roar under John Aloisi, and accept that Greenie, nice bloke that he is, may simply not cut it anymore at that level.

The frustrating thing for me is that these issues have been around for a season and a half now and yet it seems like Ernie just wants to keep banging his head against the same brick wall. Our recruitment was questionable again, and the squad is horribly unbalanced once more. 

I know that it's hard to find decent FBs at A League level, so OK, maybe that might be let slide. Except Ernie plays a formation where the FBs are left constantly exposed because we have no traditional wide midfielders or wingers who can help them deal with opposition wide players making touchline runs. So our obviously weak FBs are basically having opposition attacks funnelled at them. 

2 of our imports and one of our highest paid locals (Roly, Gui, WeeMac) are all arguably at their best in a central attacking mid role so our midfield is unbalanced from the get go. On top of that another import is also a central mid, albeit a deeper one, but he doesn't appear to be part of the first choice XI. I obviously really rate A-Rod but I also think it's retarded to use an import slot on a player who's not going to be a starter. The squad would look a lot more balanced if A-Rod's contract hadn't been extended or we hadn't signed Gui and that import spot had been used on a FB. Hell, we could have not had either of them and got 2 FBs, or a starting DM and a FB.

Then we have Kosta and Krishna, one of our best paid locals and the last import. Ernie obviously thinks he can recreate the Burns/Krishna partnership but that didn't even work for a whole season, and teams wised up on how to defend against it anyway. 

But the net result of this is that it's impossible to come up with a shape which has our best players and imports all starting in their preferred roles. And even the shape we've got them shoehorned into leads to possibly the weakest link in the team, the FBs, being left with the duties of both FBs and wide midfielders. Meanwhile our central midfield is too overloaded with players who want to hold the ball up and look for a pass that we're ponderously slow in transition and passing lanes are predictable and easily covered.

Our team resembles a social team, with a bunch of guys all trying to play the same position, a slow old guy with a good touch who is only really useful on set pieces, two ringins plonked into the FB roles because no one else wants to do it, and an attacking approach that is probably best summed up as kick it in the general direction of one of the fast guys up front and hope they can do something.

I admire the optimism of the fans who think we can turn it around but I just can't see how personally. The current system just doesn't work, and hasn't since Burns went off the boil post-Asian Cup and the rest of the league realised if they sat back then we could do nothing, and now we don't have the squad to play any other way.

Totally agree with Conan.

chant for next home game:

We play up the middle in such a muddle.

They have no trouble lifting the ball ove our rumble.

We struggle to keep the ball in the muddle. 

We struggle to keep out of trouble. 

...........

Why do we play so narrow and our opposition drop balls wide and run in behind with ease?

Not very catchy

By goly there's some angst in here. I know people are sick of excuses but there was some genuine mitigating factors, most of the players listed as missing on here in the game had just flown in. Was it bad management to play them all? Probably.

I would have liked us to start with Doyle and for Rufer to come on off the bench and mix things up.

Anyway, it's round 2, still a few more rounds until we start to worry.

more like some good observations

We don't have angst over the result. Most of us were apprehensive preseason and that is just being confirmed by the way we are playinh and how Ernie is setting us up.

I think this is all a bit too negative.  I don't think it is impossible to come up with a formation but it means some harder choices.  To me there are 3 issues we need to solve for:

- Roly needs to play closer to goal (he isn't affecting the game from a deeper position)

- Our forwards need to play closer together (both seem to be attacking from the wings which isn't working, even Watson seemed to do it when he came on)

-We need more solidity in our wide defence (Lia can't cover both full backs bombing on)

So the fix I think is not too difficult.  Lia and Rodriguez both start and stay reasonably deep (or Rufer or Ridenton).  The full backs don't push on at the same time.  Finkler plays behind the striker (probably Krishna) with Barabrouses wide one side and McGlinchey wide the other side..  Roly drops to the bench but can come on and play in the Finkler position if he isn't looking good.  Solidify the whole thing a bit

So basically move to a 4-2-3-1? Probably merit in that.