R23 V Sydney | Sunday 29th March | 5:00pm | RoF

Was their second goal offside? The first and third were as a result od season one quality defending. Reminded me of the old Keysfone Cops movies before Talkies arrived.

Before everyone rips Ridenton a new one, look on the other side, Manny was just as bad and he is one of most experienced. Today ovefall was just one big disappointment. 

The fans did not deserve this and fudgeed if I know what is going on in the players heads. Sydney were good but not that good. 

I still cant believe the A League played through an international window.

I thought so but lino said no..if it was then he also missed the high kick to head of Griffiths that preceded the Smeltz sending off....nice of him to point to score board as he left! 

Has gone down in my opinion stake.

We gave Smeltz shark, he clapped and pointed at the scoreboard. Moral victory to him on that one. At least he didn't  abuse us back.

Ridenton blatantly played him onside

Off day in all departments. It happens. Put a line through it and look to next weekend. 

Who was it that fed the unmarked Sydney player on the edge of the box allowing the ball through to Smeltz for the goal? That was horrid 

Well played Leggy!

Hamstring strain

I think most of the Nix problems today were mental. A good team don't turn to shiite in one week. Losing 6+ players to international duty must have had a big impact all week in training and preparation. I know they are pro's and should be able to cope but mentally things change...they were just not in the right head space today. Good players were doing dumb stuff. Sydney are a well drilled team but they are no world beaters...our A team is better then them.

Unfortunately the table is now super compressed at the top. Our 4 point lead on top has gone and now 2 points cover the top 5.  The battle to the end of the season will be a dog fight.

Can't blame Ridenton for this loss. He has not played much recently and is not a RB. I guess Ernie selected him because he at  least has a few A-league games under his belt. In reflection Lia might have played there with Hicks in midfield. But in reality we had a shiite day at the office.

I think Arnold deserves credit as well.   They jumped on a lot of our short passing.  Some of it was poor play by us, but some of it was good positioning and anticipation.  We got bossed.

Our corner defending has been shark for a while.

This game was an aberration, a one off ,you simply cant rip the heart out off a team that is performing like a well oil machine and expect nothing to change , Ernie's box of tricks didn't have anything left for this one and we were lucky to only  concede three goals.

Time to put tonight's fixture to bed and move on,normal service will be resumed next week against baldy Muscat and his decidedly average team.

The next three out of four games are at home with a full squad  and  no cricket distractions ,there's one tricky away game at Melbourne City in which I would  happily settle for a point in ,onwards and upwards!

Next.

Did David Dome give the team one of his inspirational speeches before kick-off?

"Look guys, if you don't win, we could lose our licence. All your good work this season will mean nothing if we lose our licence."

So that was sharkhouse! As others have said we just need to move on, I think our team is strong enough to come back from this.

Really felt it showed how much we was missing WeeMac in the midfield and someone like Burns making runs up front. Annoyed to lose Reira to a red, but we have such depth this year that I can see us being able to cover that lost even against Victory.

Id imagine it would be something more along the lines of "You lot better show up today, or we're probably going to have to shut up shop on you miserable cods"

Was just going to say that we missed WeeMac possibly more than Burns or anyone else. Their midfielders just sat on Roly all day long, and Rodriguez was sitting quite deep, so we really couldn't get anything going through the middle of the park. The other major thing I noticed was how heavy our touches were today, and how many of our passes completely missed their intended recipients. There was no fluidity at all. It sometimes looked like a number of our players hadn't met each other before (even the ones that have been playing all season). Horrible game.

God save the Queen? really? 

The twuntiness was strong yesterday

Thought it was a bit odd. But they were one of the very few people trying to make some noise. All too familiar when the Phoenix go behind.

zone was booming early doors but quiet and packing a sad in the second half 

I'm sorry, but that's bullshark. We only had 4 out. Hardley means to call off a game.

To be fair, the entire nation was packing a sad.

Three out is enough in English football.

The best part of the game was when the stadium speaker announced Hard News as sponsor of The Griff.

What the hell was that? I know that we played like rubbish but that was Phoenix of old rubbish. Its an international window and all but you do not throw in Ridenton, who was coming back from injury and out of position in there (or a rookie as an alternative) and you don't make that tackle on a player going back towards his own goal closer to half way to get sent off.... Granted those points alone did not decide the game but the RB scenario was huge for that game as an episode within it and what it does to Ridenton mentally and Rieras send off is huge for next week.

Playing anyone not named Lia at RB - I kinda said earlier in the week that it would be just completely brainless to bring in anyone other than Lia. I am surprised Ernie thought that would have worked out any other way than it did. Why Riera made that tackle like that, its a team killer. Its schoolboy stuff. There was no danger there. There was no need to make it. I just scream out "WHY?!?!"

I don't think there needs to be much of a post mortem on this considering the players that were out, will now be out and whom are coming back. Its more looking forward and playing Victory without a DM....

Reading the thread, it seems Ridenton played Smeltzy onside. My apologies for the one or two unkind words I may have said to the Lino.

Also well-played by the Sydney fans on the shirts off at 80.  Excellent pisstaking.

Did not keep them off long. Soft cocks.

Decent noise from them as well. Best away bay at RoF for quite some time.

They are good lads as well.  Some were at the Kings watching Friday night's game with the Fever and plenty in the Bencher yesterday.

We've always enjoyed a visit from them and as they turned up in Palmerston North in numbers they share a bond with us.

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'strayan.

Even more 'strayan and a convict to boot

But he was a Pom.