20 January 2007

Round Twenty Report

Sorry this is so late - having started a new job things are little busy! I write this knowing that Newcastle have secured a spot in the finals, and that Queensland and Sydney will duke it out for the final position, joining Melbourne and Adelaide.

The biggest loss of Round Twenty wasn't a match, but rather a player. Bobby Despotovski finally called it quits on a remarkable national league career. It was a pity the A-League never really saw him at the top of his game, even if he still managed to win the inaugural Johnny Warren medal for best player last season as voted by his peers. It's hard to imagine another veteran, Kevin Muscat, not winning the same award this time around. (Edit: Except, of course, he has been given a red card, and so is inelligible for the award. In which case, maybe the likes of Simon Colosimo, Daniel Allsopp and Matt McKay will stand the best chance.)

Best of Round Twenty:

Player: Joel Griffiths, Newcastle - two very late goals to pull the Jets back into finals contention

U-20 Player: Tando Velaphi, Queensland - the round's other match-winning, season-saving performance

Coach: John Kosmina, Adelaide - continues to play the psychological game - especially with Sydney - with some degree of success, seems to have pulled Ross Aloisi back into some semblance of form, and made excellent work of his bench this week

Match: Perth Glory vs Newcastle United Jets

4-4-2 Team of the Week:

Damian Mori - Joel Griffiths
Matt McKay - Nick Carle - Simon Colosimo - Leo Bertos
Matt Thompson - Michael Valkanis - Che Bunce - Steve Eagleton
Tando Velaphi

Subs: Daniel Beltrame, Richie Alagich, Richard Johnson, Reinaldo

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not bad son. keep up the good work.

john said...

Tando Velaphi seems to have done a better job than Reddy did in the final round?