WITH Adelaide of-late offering feeble defence against Melbourne's grand final juggernaut, going into this match I was finding it difficult to summon enthusiasm for something other than the now-infamous term 'pissant'.

Six-nil snore or otherwise, I just wanted a bit of niggle, a red card, and for 'anyone but Archie' to score.

I got all three and then some. Just not necessarily in the manner I'd expected.

Niggle not numptiness

With Melbourne effectively handing Adelaide a 6-0 shellacking not once, but twice in the A-League's short finals history, and with hard men Ognenovski and Muscat heading overseas and (it was rumoured) into retirement respectively, this match couldn't promise to be evenly matched, but it could promise a bit of niggle.

What I didn't expect was quite so much dibber dobberness, with first Muscat and then Galekovic scurrying over to the match officials to point out perceived grievances that the officials had either not spotted or had dismissed in the course of play.

Both efforts resulted in red cards, granting me my second wish twice. But I was after niggle, not numptiness. Nobody likes a dobber, guys. Nobody.

Two reds don't make a right

Red cards are best served cold at a climactic moment. Not ten lukewarm minutes in.

Most people would still have been in the beer queue or navigating awkwardly to their seats with four beers in hand when the first card was issued. And the rest of the crowd, hoping for at least a slightly more even match-up this meeting, would have had their heads in their hands with a 6-0 deja vu drubbing looking increasingly likely.

If the referee didn't sight the incident himself and doesn't have the benefit of a video referee to review it, blood or no blood, impassioned pleas from less-than-objective opposition captain Muscat or not, at just 10 minutes in, you'd have to seriously question going red.

A second red for an also-unsighted headbutt to even up the numbers does not redeem the first.

Anyone but Archie

I might not have cared who won, but I found it incredibly poetic that the man least likely to - but who did - score the game's sole and match-deciding goal was quiet achiever Pondeljak.

Archie 'I can't stand his Anthony Mundine-esque cockiness and his lame-o flag boxing goal scoring celebration' Thompson not scoring in the grand final? That's a victory all in itself.

Replays, sweet replays

But all I could think sitting in front of the screen as each occurred (or, in the case of Thompson, didn't) was thank God for FOXTEL. Who needs live Grand Final atmosphere when you can experience at home what the Telstra Dome and Adelaide's own coach didn't: replays.

It's been a bone of contention with me for four seasons now - five, if you include the also replay starved W-League - but contrary to the A-League officialdom's thinking not replaying the action that I've just missed because I've either been in the bathroom, talking to friends, or, gee, blinking, makes me want to start a riot.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: if I go to see a match, I expect to see all aspects of it. And if League fans can be trusted with replays, football fans most definitely can. Show us the action and then get on with the game. Otherwise we'll be inspired with good reason to watch the games from FOXTEL afar.