R3 vs Western Sydney Wanderers | Sat 3rd Nov | 7:35pm | Westpac Stadium

What a day this is going to be. I've been fired up for a week. Dura's 250th, My 150th consecutive A League game in NZ with the Phoenix including play off games, My Birthday on Friday and my young fella, Micki, is leading the team out with Dura (Unless he is naughty and plays up ;) - Micki, not Dura). All the planets are aligned. Come on Nix. the lucky charm will be at the game - Micki, 2 wins and 2 draws thus far. 3, wins and 2 draws sounds better.

When he comes off the field, a zonal chorus of "We love you Micki, we do" would be much appreciated please. He'd be very surprised and I want him to feel special, cause he is. 

Williams is pretty small too.

Williams 1.77cm

Burns 1.73cm

Krishna 1.70cm

Williams has some strength despite looking frail. He can hold off someone annoying him. 

Or that classic Toni Basil song from 1981.

Well done getting to 150.

Yeah well, He's 7 years old and it might be a buzz for him. Micki is short for Mickitai.

Needs more unwarranted negativity.

But that is very sweet, here's hoping we can get the job done to put the icing on a very good cake!

Sure would be. Honest. The fans of the future lead the team out. 

Could adapt Elton John "Nikita" song to go "Oh Mickitai we love you so"

We went from exestensial despair last season to organising a chant to make a kids day extra special

More of this please

More positivity..this time re trains(except HVL)

https://www.metlink.org.nz/service-updates/additional-seating-for-phoenix-vs-sydney-wanderers-saturday-3-november/

Trick or treat Phoenix?

yeah thanks did not know about that. what is the best option for us to miss this ?

Via Tawa exiting at Porirua is doable option at 50kph and even off Keneouru Drive at Linden and over to East side..both join back at Tawa interchange.

Expect it to be really messed up through tawa / main Rd. I'd park at Paremata and train it. Queues could be a long way back

Has anyone else noticed that in 180 minutes of football the only 2 goals we've scored are an own goal and a rebound off a crummy penalty?

We are trying to be glass half full here!

Created the better chances in both games though, the front line was the last part of the team to be recruited and the last to be worked on so it might take a couple of games to click.

Yes. I am wondering where the goals are going to come from in this formation, with these players in the longer term.

 I am sure Ole can fix it. I am surprised that an anti Phoenix troll like yourself bothers with Yellow Fever threads.

That's mature and constructive. I think the issues are this formation with wide players on the counter and no physical central striker. Doesn't seem to work to me.

I'm just happy to win this year to be honest!

Smidge too early for goal-scoring angst IMO. It's been two games; one against last year's losing finalists and the other away from home which has never been great for us regardless.

If VAR wasn't a thing, Singh would've scored in round 1, and Taylor's miss is just one of those things - 99 times out of 100 he'd bury that.

I'll give Rudan a few more rounds before pulling at my hair!

It would be good to see Burns and Nichols being given a bit more of a run. I thought Rudan left it too late against Brisbane before bringing them on. Burnsy may be past his best, but in combination with Singh and Krishna I think there's some goal scoring talent there. 

The statistic of thousand of games says it was 50/50 chance, makes me feel better.

He's right, we are having trouble scoring goals. However, we're a bloody tight unit that doesn't leak goals so that's good enough at the moment!
This needs to improve if we want to make the playoffs but there's plenty of time for that especially since we've added several recruits to the squad late and Rudan's first priority was always going to fix our shoddy defense and weak mentality.

Winning 1-0 counts just as much as winning 6-5.

Let's be honest, if we won a whole bunch of games 1-0 and it got us in the play offs no one would bat an eyelid.

How nice would it be to miss out on winning stuff because of GD :)

I have no problems with focusing on defence first, especially considering the last 2 seasons. The difficulty comes if later in the season we are to still struggling to score; then i'll be worried - now, meh, we've started very well all things considered.

Has anyone else noticed that in 180 minutes of football we have only conceded 1 goal, and it was from a pretty amazing counter attack when we had basically already won the game?

Referee: Jarred Gillett

Assistant Referee 1: Mark Rule

Assistant Referee 2: Anton Shchetinin

Fourth Official: Matthew Conger

VAR: Nick Waldron

Wellington Phoenix squad:1.Filip KURTO (gk), 4.Mandi SOSA, 5.Ryan LOWRY, 6.Dylan FOX, 8.Mitch NICHOLS, 9.Nathan BURNS, 11.David WILLIAMS, 13.Liberato CACACE, 14.Alex RUFER, 15.Michal KOPZCYNSKI, 16.Louis FENTON, 18.Sarpreet SINGH, 19.Tom DOYLE, 20.Oliver SAIL (gk), 21.Roy KRISHNA, 22.Andrew DURANTE (C), 23.Max BURGESS, 27.Steven TAYLOR

**two to be omitted**

Ins: 6.Dylan FOX (promoted) 15.Michal KOPZCYNSKI (promoted)

Outs: Nil

Unavailable: Nil

Western Sydney Wanderers FCsquad: 1.Danijel NIZIC (gk), 4.Josh RISDON, 5.Brendan HAMILL (c), 7.Nick FITZGERALD, 8.Jordan O’DOHERTY, 9.Oriol RIERA, 10.Alex BAUMJOHANN, 11.Bruce KAMAU, 12.Ruon TONGYIK, 13.Tass MOURDOUKOUAS, 16.Jaushua SOTIRIO, 17.Keanu BACCUS, 20.Vedran JANJETOVIC (gk), 21.Tarek ELRICH, 22.Rashid MAHAZI, 24.Raul LLORENTE, 28.Roly BONEVACIA, 49.Abraham MAJOK

Ins: 7.Nick FITZGERALD (promoted), 13.Tass MOURDOUKOUTAS (promoted)

Outs: Nil

Unavailable: 19.Mark BRIDGE (injury – four weeks)

The last time @WgtnPhoenixFC fielded the same starting 11 for three straight games was R1, 2 and 3 of the 2014/15 @ALeague season...
Moss, Muscat, Sigmund, Durante, Doyle, Riera, Bonevacia, Rodriguez, McGlinchey, Brockie, Burns.

— Jason Pine (@pineyzb) November 1, 2018

Where we went Lost, Win, Win in those games. 

any predictions for Fox's season?