AT THE beginning of this season, many Melbourne Victory fans, myself included, were salivating at the depth and quality of our squad and the possibility of adding some more silverware to our already impressive trophy cabinet.

Early on in the season, many of our hopes were appearing to be justified with a string of impressive results. But of late, the form hasn't been so crash hot, with only one win in five matches, and that was against a rather insipid Perth Glory outfit.

This culminated in what many are describing as one of our worst-ever performances against our most hated rival, Sydney, and in the process suffering our first ever home defeat to them and bringing to an end a run of over 1000 days since the last one.

What I believe is the main reason for this recent slump all comes to one thing, ill discipline. For weeks now, in other forums, I have been defending my team and their disciplinary record, instead pointing the finger of blame at referees, opposition players, the FFA and the judiciary system.

But in reality I should have always been pointing that finger of mine in only one direction - at the team itself. I guess the disappointment of last night's result was the straw that finally broke the camel's back.

Before last night, Melbourne had received four red cards in five matches, and in all but one case, these had resulted in the recipient receiving more than the mandatory one-week suspension. Apart from the red card received by Carlos Hernandez, all have been received for acts of ill discipline. And where this has hurt us most is in the attacking half of the pitch.

How many more people would have turned out last night if there was the possibility of a seeing a rampaging Archie Thompson against an inexperienced Sydney backline? Or even an attacking quartet of Ney Fabiano, Hernandez, Danny Allsopp and the aforementioned Thompson? I reckon that's at least another five to ten thousand people through the gates.

But no, one moment of ill discipline among a series of others has potentially cost us the possibility cementing our position on top of the table, but more importantly it has given bragging rights to our most hated rivals. And that is what probably hurts the most.

Victory are currently at the beginning of a run of nine matches where only three of them will be at home and this could possibly make or break our fourth season. The spate of red cards has to stop and the players admit that there is an issue with discipline and commit to doing something about it, otherwise what was looking like a promising season will disappear down the gurgler faster than Matthew Breeze can pull a red card from his back pocket...or his front pocket...or wherever he keeps the damn things.

Neil Zimmerman has been a Melbourne Victory fan since the beginning and has only ever missed two Victory home games. He has very little footballing talent but does use what little he does have for his indoor soccer team on a weekly basis. In his spare time he is also the editor of the84thminute and also runs the Victory In Melbourne site,