So over a family lunch on Australia Day my cousin and I were commenting on the Australian Cricket team. My cousin was very negative about a few players and I was agreeing about some of the players but defending a few others. This sparked comments from a few of the women folk at the table how people who have never played the sport at a professional level should not have an opinion about such things as selections on sporting teams. After every male at the table scoffed at the comment the conversation of course moved back to Cricket and eventually on to the Socceroos. So this got me back to thinking on the Mariners and the team I would love to see take the park if I could pick the squad.
I did put some restrictions on my selections however, as much as I would love to see Messi and Sneijder turned out in Blue and Yellow, I thought I would try and keep the fantasy team selections in the realms of the outside chance. So I thought through the whole Mariners starting XI and a few key replacements in each positions. So the blog this week is in honour of this dream team.
The team is selected with the standard 4-4-2 formation that the Mariners have preferred to play this season.
Start the team at the back and as much as I think Matt Ryan has performed well I think at this early stage in his career I would pick another keeper over him. I went through the top keepers in the A-League and contemplated the idea of Schwazer but ruled him out as being in that over the top realm. I short listed the keeper role down to four players. Galekovic , Vukovic, Langerak and in all positions I included the Mariners players in the current squad. As my keeper I selected Vukovic ably backed up by Matt Ryan. I admit that Galekovic and Langerak may have more skill and capability than the Vukes, but I decided the personality and connection he has with the fans brings much more to a club than the miniscule difference in skill. I likewise kept Ryan as backup because he is a Mariners junior team product and I think that is also good for the club to show a junior progression path.
Moving on to my back four I contemplated the role as two sets of two players, centre backs and fullbacks. After contemplating the current squad and the realistic selections that could be made I decided to leave the back four exactly as it is. I don't think I would make any changes at this point, then I suddenly I had a revelation, I would make one change. I would go out to Korea and bring the Ogg Monster into my team. Ognenovski would sure up the centre of the backline with Wilkinson as his partner. I would also keep Chris Doig as a first backup for the squad. This leaves the back four as Bojic, Wilkinson, Ognenovski and Rose.
Moving up the field into our holding midfield position I have decided just seconds ago that Griffiths gets moved to the bench as a backup for the holding midfield. The man I have decided to play in front of the back four is Patrich Swaanswijk, although he is a centre back I think in the A-League his skill on the ball (barring that one error last Sunday) is far too good to waste at the back of the field. His defence is obviously superb but his ability to get his head up and to distribute the ball off the back four is without question. He could deliver a new dimension to the Mariners moving forward more often than he does in his current role.
The wide midfielders presented some interesting questions. The guys who are there now offer some great play and unbelievable skill going forward, but then there are some players in the league that offer just as much and possibly more. The four players I decided to consider here were the two incumbent wide midfielders, Thomas Broich and David Williams. After some thought I would bring in David Williams and keep both of our existing midfielders. I would use the rotation system that Graham Arnold has used at the end of the season to give the three guys an equal share of the field play. I would however start with the two existing Midfielders in a crunch game.
The next position threw up a large number of options. Central Attacking Midfield has a huge number of candidates. The first two that came to me I immediately dismissed as being too out there in Tim Cahill and Harry Kewell. So I pulled back my vision and contemplated a short list consisting of Perez, Amini, McKay and Cullina. I then culled this list of Cullina as his age is starting to bring some injuries. This left me with Perez, Amini and Matt McKay, how do you cull players from that list? All three of them are great but I decided to keep Matt McKay and Perez to fight out the starting position and place Amini as the definite backup to the top player. So after this season and the Socceroos I decided the Matt McKay would be my choice on current form with Amini as my backup.
Moving on to the front third. The short list was the three guys in the current squad (I could not bring myself to consider Mrdja), Robbie Fowler, Sergio Van Dijk, Archie Thompson, Shane Smeltz and Scott McDonald. After throwing names out and back in I decided it was almost as important to consider the combination as the individual. So I finally settled on a pairing of Matt Simon and Patricio Perez. Although Matt Simon has his short comings and problems he also has a number of benefits and advantages. Simon runs all day long and this can bring about as many chances as it does fouls. His touch and positioning is improving under Arnold and will probably continue to do so, however that desire and running is something you cannot teach a player. Perez may be smaller and he may be a CAM at the moment but I believe his run into the box and the deft finish on Sunday showed he could easily play in front of goal. With these two I would have Sergio Van Dijk as a backup as he could provide fill in either of the two striker roles.
So my dream team (not fantasy as I would pick a heap of other players for this) consists of:
---------------------Vukovic -------------------
Bojic - Ognenovski - Wilkinson - Rose
------------------Zwaanswijk -----------------
------Bozanic --------------- McGlinchey----
----------------------McKay----------------------
-----------------Simon - Perez ---------------
Bench:
Ryan
Griffiths
Van Dijk
Amini
This team is pretty much as per the Mariners now. I have only introduced 4-5 players across the top 15. One is an ex-Mariner and was selected predominately for this purpose. This speaks well for the squad now.
