He's back.

Old Archibald, after suffering a serious knee injury in the grand final last season, is back on the field after his little cameo against Gold Coast last Saturday night. It brought much joy to my heart to see such a wonderful servant to the club and the league come back from such a serious injury as that.

However, I don't believe his presence will be enough to help Victory surge forward. He'll still be dangerous, will still kick goals, but I hold grave fears that he may no longer possess the ability to light up the league, to run opposition defences ragged like he has done over the years.

We've seen how it has slowed Billy down just a shade, resulting in him coming back to the pack from his stellar campaign in the 2008/2009 season where he was one of the key reasons behind the success of Victory. If you look at Archie's game, we see that he relies as much on his blistering pace as he does his trickery and cunning. Knee injuries slow you down, and I fear Archie will be no exception.

That said, it might actually keep him onside!

I know this blog seems unusually pessismistic , but who wouldn't be after the inspid performance that was dished up on Saturday night? No imagination and no earnestness created a lacklustre Victory side. Not even Robbie Kruse in excellent form could salvage anything against a Gold Coast side that came with a gameplan and executed it perfectly. Victory were frustrated, and as a result, made mistakes, which ultimately led to Vargas nestling the ball in the back of his own net. You never like to see those happen, but that is the nature of the game that we all love and loathe. Hopefully Vargas realises this and picks himself up for the trip west.

Archie on the other hand, needs to relearn where the goals are after his stint on the sidelines. I have no doubt he'll find them, but will he be the same prodigal son, the same messiah that has wowed us for the best part of five seasons now? Only time will tell, but this humble little blogger believes that it won't all be sunshine and lollipops for Ernie and the crew now that Archie is back. It'll still be a hard slog for the remainder of the season, a season where we may have to be content with just sneaking into the finals.

Not an easy fate for Victory fans to accept so readily, after years of excellence.