A-League

After starting a thread on the English Premier League a few weeks ago, I thought it would also be interesting to hear people's opinion of the A-League. Living in Brisbane i support Queensland Roar. Although the A-League is not of the standard of the EPL i still think there are some great players here and the league has definitely improved over the last 4 seasons.

Sorry to dig this out of the grave, But I follow the A-league, Sydney FC in particular and wanted to know if there are any other fans out there?

With the finals starting this week it is going to be another big week for the a-league.

Also a recent article published in 442 (sorry no link) talked about the number of billionaire and multi millionaires currently involved in the game.

Where other codes are struggling for $$$ many clubs now have owners with very deep pockets happy to fund teams, just wondering what everyones views are on this

investorpaul said:

Sorry to dig this out of the grave, But I follow the A-league, Sydney FC in particular and wanted to know if there are any other fans out there?

With the finals starting this week it is going to be another big week for the a-league.

Also a recent article published in 442 (sorry no link) talked about the number of billionaire and multi millionaires currently involved in the game.

Where other codes are struggling for $$$ many clubs now have owners with very deep pockets happy to fund teams, just wondering what everyones views are on this

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Can't say I'm overly enthused by the finals this year. Melbourne do have the odd moment where they look like a quality football team, but they are too few and far between for me to get too excited. Will prolly watch the finals on telly anyway, no matter how bad the football turns out to be!


Must have been a tough year for you investorpaul being an FC fan? At least Kossie was shown the door, you guys may actually get to watch some decent football next year

I will be making absolutely no effort to support Newcastle next year, if Con won't open his wallet to keep players, I won't be opening mine to go and watch our disgraceful excuse of a team play

Besides our results I absolutely loved this season. I sit in the cove and the best moments where booing John Aloisi off the field after missing two sitters and singing what a waste of money.

Signing for Kofi Danning after he scored an 86th min goal was also awesome the crowd went nuts - probably the most I have ever seen it.

With our new coach and assistant coach coming in next year I am expecting big things.

I am also look forward to seeing Gold Coast United and Fowler (who has just been confirmed to play with North Queensland)

investorpaul said:

Besides our results I absolutely loved this season. I sit in the cove and the best moments where booing John Aloisi off the field after missing two sitters and singing what a waste of money.

Signing for Kofi Danning after he scored an 86th min goal was also awesome the crowd went nuts - probably the most I have ever seen it.

With our new coach and assistant coach coming in next year I am expecting big things.

I am also look forward to seeing Gold Coast United and Fowler (who has just been confirmed to play with North Queensland)

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yeah Danning could be an interesting one to watch over the next season or 2(provided he doesn't join half the a-league in an average Turkish, Chinese or Korean club!)

Ditto on the gold coast, should be interesting to see how they go. Personally would have preferred to see them splash out on a top level coach, but Miron Bleiberg should have them playing a decent brand of football.

Not overly keen on te Robbie Fowler move though, I'm not a fan of these older players at the end of their careers showing up here, personally I'd prefer to see money being spent on quality coaches, and finding some imports that are able to play here for more than 1 or 2 seasons, but hey, if he puts bums on seats up there and doesn't embarrass himself then it will be a good move. Hopefully they can put a team on the park that will provide him with enough service to score a few goals too.

Yer all these players heading to China, Japan, Korea is really annoying. Turkey isnt so bad because it is a stepping stone to Europe.

I fear that those who head to Asia will be "lost" and play no part in Australia's national team as previous history proves.

investorpaul said:

Yer all these players heading to China, Japan, Korea is really annoying. Turkey isnt so bad because it is a stepping stone to Europe.

I fear that those who head to Asia will be "lost" and play no part in Australia's national team as previous history proves.

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I don't think that would be entirely bad though. If players know they probably won't make the national team if they head off to other Asian leagues then they may think twice before going. Though on the flip side, players playing in Korea or China may come in handy if we have to go and play them in a WCQ and have troubles getting European players for a midweek game.

It's going to be tough to keep even average A league players when they can make 4-5 times as much playing in some of the other Asian leagues. It would be great if the salary cap could be changed so this didn't happen so often, like allowing clubs to add on any proceeds from player sales to their cap for that year, at least that would allow for clubs to spend some more money without endangering the financial stability of each club. And if they can sell 1 player so that they can pay more to the rest so that they don't end up losing 5 or 6 in a season then it could work out pretty well. Would also be a good incentive for the clubs to spend more developing local youth too if they know that when they sell them on to bigger leagues they can buy more players without beaching the cap.

If things stay the way they are, we are going to be watching something that is a similar standard to the old NSL just before it died

investorpaul said:

Also a recent article published in 442 (sorry no link) talked about the number of billionaire and multi millionaires currently involved in the game.

Where other codes are struggling for $$$ many clubs now have owners with very deep pockets happy to fund teams, just wondering what everyones views are on this

Click to expand...

Its nice to for clubs to have owners with deep pockets (e.g. Clive Palmer at GC United) but it is a balancing act between letting these rich owners pay the players more (i.e increasing the salary cap) so they don't have to go to the better paying Asian / European leagues while at the same time not alienating the clubs who don't have the rich owners.

the a-league season is about a month away now.

getting exciting, Brisbane has now just finalised the squad. looking forward to the kick off. Despite the departures in the off season of players like mckay, babarouses, solarzano, dever from our record breaking 28 game and still undefeated team. Weve got some serious depth in our team now I think, just going off our options for the front 3 - berisha, danning, Iffey, broich, henrique, meyer, fitzgerald, visconte.

im thinking 1st XI were going to line up like this.

Iffey - Berisha - Henrique
Broich - nicholls
Paartalu
Stefanutto - Adnan - Smith - Cirnak

but that leaves the likes of danning, meyer, murdocca, Jurman, hingert, brattan on the bench. honestly there are so many options within this team, Ange has built a footballing team with serious depth. Every game last season was a joy to watch, and the new season has got me excited.

6th round this weekend. So far the mighty Brisbane are flying through the competition. Should spank the undermanned Wellington this weekend (who without Paul Ifill lack a bit of class) Making it 34 games undefeated .. and a 6 game undefeated start to this season.

Im really hoping we can hold onto this team going into the Asian Champions League at the end of the A-league season.