Like a virgin bride, rushed to the altar the hour before her husband boards a ship to fight in another empire's war, Adelaide are saving the best for later.
You see, the Asian Champions League is the big prize and Adelaide - with the assistance of our brilliant FFA overseers - have devised a plan so cunning, so devilish, so mind-bendingly brilliant that we have the whole country - nay, the entire region - fooled.
Go on, you know that you think Adelaide are crap at the moment. You do, don't you? Ha! Tricked you. We are, in fact, a world beating, slick-passing, goal-machine lying in wait for the start of the ACL. Then watch us! Out troop the opposition, assuming that we're lambs to the slaughter - a simple exercise in boosting the 'goals for' column - and we proceed to take them apart. Every game's a walkover to us. We hoist the cup. We're Champions of Asia!
This dawned on me tonight during the draw for the ACL. Pohang, Shandong and some easybeat, mid-table Japanese team all wait, unprepared, for the might of the Adelaide onslaught. We've been so clever that they'll never suspect.
Whatever you do, don't send this blog to a friend in Asia! We don't want to spoil the surprise.
It's cruel, isn't it, what watching a good episode of Dr Who will do to a man struggling to maintain a sense of hope. Even the most far-fetched plots suddenly seem plausible. C'mon, maybe we're missing our shots on purpose. We might be. It's remotely possible. Isn't it?
No?
Bugger! That means we are crap.
Strangely enough we're not playing as badly as we could but we can't buy a goal. It may be time to start sacrificing goats in the change rooms at half time in hope of a solution. It can't be much worse than writing self-help slogans on a white board. Things are dire.
So where do we go from here? The reality is that morale is low and there is no easy way back up. Even the loyal fans have started to stay home and wait for the morning papers - or the 442 forums - to find out what happened. It'll probably get worse yet. And, in saying that, I'm not giving in to gloom. It just probably will. But then it'll get better.
Slowly but gradually. Better.
So, what do you do in the meantime? Well, we fans keep supporting. Sometimes we vent and sometimes we cheer. But we keep coming back because the Reds are our team and we love our team. Like you love your Dad even when he leaves your Mum and wrecks your life. You love him because you do, even if you don't want to. We're stuck.
As for the team, well we'll all have an opinion. Here's mine.
Take some risks and play the guys who want to play and bleed for the team. That means some tough calls. It's time to bring some young guys up. It's time to change the leadership.
To start, Eugene becomes captain. Reid becomes vice captain. Dodd and Pantelis go and play youth league.
This week we line up like this:
Hugene (C)
Mullen Cornthwaite Rudan Jamo
Reid
Barbiero Shin Cassio
Owusu Monterosso
Bench: Cristiano, Sarkies, Birighitti, Marrone .
Leckie we send to get better. Owusu we give a chance because he knows the youth team guys. Jamo we remind that he's class - and tell to play left back instead of everywhere-man.
We ask them all to go out and make us proud of them, win or lose. We ask them to play football because it's a great game. We ask them to shoot on sight. We give them a game plan and ask them to trust each other. We back them and we play them again next week.
Meanwhile we go to the FFA and ask if they really want to see one of the finest clubs in the A-league vanish. We ask them for money for a playmaker and a striker who can score - and we pay what it takes.
Then we start to rebuild. It may not be a cunning plan. But at least it's a plan.
Viddie, are you listening? No-one has to tell you this is last-chance saloon. Strap on your shin-pads, keep your mouth shut and get us out of this. You can if you have the guts.
