Ever had one of those moments where you have achieved something, yet your sense of accomplishment is tinged by disappointment? Perhaps you won fairest and best in your local amateur comp, but your team lost the final? Maybe you graduated university with honours, but with marks slightly lower than what you would have liked. Or then again, perhaps your team has just qualified for their first A-League finals campaign - but you feel like they could have finished a bit higher on the table.
It might sound melancholy of me, but I can’t escape a sense of missed opportunity in season 2009/2010. Yes, Glory have made the finals - and for that I’m grateful to Tony Sage and his team, and of course the players and coach as well. But have we ended up where we should have been, given the squad we had at the start of the season? I’m not so sure...
Please, dear readers, do not think for a second that I believe we should have won the league this year. For the most part, Sydney and Melbourne were a cut above this year, and they deservedly fought it out for the title. Indeed, it would be remiss of me to get above my station when you consider these recent medical findings. But if you’d presented me with three Socceroos, an ex-EPL defender, and an ex-Bundesliga striker at the beginning of the season, I’d be hard pressed to say that a team containing those players could finish any lower than fourth under a decent coach.
But here we are. Fifth place, no home final, and an away trip across the other side of the freakin’ world (well, we’re not playing where I am, but you get the point). Is it a terrible result? No, not by any means - especially when you consider three consecutive second-last finishes. But is it a good result? I think you’re beginning to see the problem here.
Tony Sage is an ambitious man. He’s no idiot - unlike Mr Palmer he doesn’t try grabbing the headlines with outlandish statements or acts of stupidity - but he doesn’t exactly set the bar low for his employees. He made his plan perfectly clear to Dave Mitchell at the start of this season:
2009/2010 : Finals football
2010/2011 : Grand Final
2011/2012 : Champions, the ACL, and beyond...
Pretty lofty aims - but you’ve got to have goals, right?
Thing is, David Mitchell has met goal number one. Just. If the A-League had stuck with the (in my opinion, anyway) superior final-four system instead of going for a final-six, the club would once again be missing out on post-season action. Moreover, the bigger problem is that ‘Mitch’ hasn’t yet given any indication that he has more in the tank for next year. Much like the EPL team who is happy to find themselves in mid-table obscurity, I haven’t seen Mitchell yet demonstrate the potential to be a title-winning coach in the A-League.
For all of Mitchell's excellent recruitment this year, next season Perth’s already experienced squad will be another year older, our salary cap just as full, and there’ll be precious few free spots available in the squad for new arrivals. Assuming McGarry and Todd (please!) re-sign, we’ll have one visa spot free but barely any money to spend on it.
In a way, Perth are locking themselves into a very dangerous spot here - they’ve spent big on older, experienced stars on three year contracts, but with every year those stars get just a little more tired. The toilet-seat shaped question then becomes; can the club achieve its aims before the stars burn out?
It doesn’t help that coach Mitchell continues to put young players like Andrija Jukic and Tommy Amphlett in his peripheral vision. Against Brisbane last Sunday, Perth started with an experienced big man duo of Harnwell and McBreen up front, supported by a pretty experienced midfield behind them. The lineup looked something like so:
Velaphi
J. Coyne --- Todd -- Neville - Sekulovski
Pellegrino --- Srhoj --- McGarry --- Howarth
Harnwell --- McBreen
Now, had we been playing for fourth spot, I’d imagine no problems with putting this team on the park - indeed, it might have even been strengthened with some of the ‘almost fit’ guys we have currently sitting in the stands. But why, when he knew there was nothing riding on this match, did David Mitchell risk important players like McBreen and Sekulovski, when we have youthful replacements wanting to show their worth in the senior side?
Indeed, when players like Pellegrino and Jamie Coyne have been playing all year, surely the coach knows what they are and are not capable of? Why bother risking injuries or suspensions in a game that’s essentially a glorified friendly? Why were we not instead looking to blood some youngsters in a game that would truly have no impact on our final position? At worst, they’d not be ready for the A-League ‘big time’ - at best, we could uncover some finals bolters; maybe a kid with the ‘X-factor’ needed to make a difference in the knockout phase? For example, here’s a suggested lineup:
Velaphi
Evans/Doyle --- Todd ----- Neville ----- Brent Griffiths
Ludovic Boi ---- Jukic --- McGarry --- Glen Triforo
Harnwell --- Amphlett
Bench: Aleks, Sikora, Srhoj, McBreen
Here you have an experienced spine of Harnwell, McGarry, and Todd - two of whom are in serious need of match practice - leading a group of youngsters hungry to cement a starting berth (Jukic, Boi, Amphlett) or ready to be tested at A-League level (Hayden Doyle, Dean Evans, Brent Griffiths, Glen Triforo). On the bench we have Victor Sikora and Wayne Srhoj, ready to come on for half a match’s worth of practice, and Danny McBreen and Aleks Vrteski sitting by as injury cover. What’s more, eight of the starting XI are WA-based players - something sure to get the crowd (and the local clubs) behind the team. What have you got to lose?
Unfortunately, that scenario was not to be; and it’s decisions like this, along with his perceived tactical inflexibility and poor motivational skills, that still makes me wonder if Dave Mitchell’s Glory is up to a good finals run this year - never mind making the boss’ goals for the years beyond.
Still, there’s not much you can do, is there? Come this weekend I’ll still be up at 4am, Glory kit over my pyjamas, to cheer my team on; and my heart sincerely hopes that Mitchell can achieve Tony Sage’s aims. My head however has other ideas - and it is this that stops me getting too excited, too soon.
For the battle may have been won, but not as convincingly as some would have hoped. And the war is only just beginning...
