Changchun and their 4 national team players had a great opening 20 minutes. But when they couldn't make anything out of good breakaway opportunities and getting behind Adelaide - they lost their spark.
ACL has made a mistake offering the A-League only 2 spots and teams from China and Iran 4. they should have looked at the opportunity that is Brisbane and Sydney for Asian football. The A-League lost points for 'organisation'. I wonder what the assessment was based on? Perhaps all the questions were whether they think we are arrogant (which we are but so are the countries that won out - the more self effacing nations lost their spots). The A-League is not the 21st best organisation in Asia.
Adelaide, and in particular coach Vidmar, have earned their place in the top 8. It should be like the tennis Davis Cup. Your country proves it can make the finals and it gets automatic entry to the group stage.
Changchun were outplayed by Adelaide and by the second half it became clear that they had no answers except diving and lost tempers. I imagine Chinese players are pushed to the edge and when they look like missing out the pressure gets too much from them (remember the Chinese U21 tour of England and their fight with they hosts).
Adelaide know how to play 'ground them out' football and with the Chinese playing 'long ball' it just became too easy.
Some player analysis:
Eugene Galekovic played a risky game in goal and chose wrongly to punch out too many times.
Richie Alagich had a great last game, no one really got past him.
Sasa Ognenovski is fitting right in and will be a massive loss to the Roar (I haven't seen any sign of a replacement yet).
Nathan Burns and Bruce Djite played their last games and will both be missed. However, Adelaide has signed two more Brazilians and Cassio will be back for the start of the A-League season. Nathan Burns had it over the Chinese mid-field.
Angelo Costanzo is back to form.
4 comments:
Four teams out of an 8 team league is a bit ridiculous. That would be half your competition going to Asia. Winning the premiership or the grand final is the best option at this stage. Also by your reckoning, just because both Korean teams had a poor group stage this year they wouldn't get a team into next year's competition. Places in the ACL should be earned on merit in your own league.
Four teams out of an 8 team league is a bit ridiculous. - maybe maybe not - I was critising the process that said the A-League was badly organised which it is not.
'both Korean teams had a poor group stage this year they wouldn't get a team into next year's competition.'
No Neil, in Davis Cup if you drop out early then the next year you have to win more games to qualify. This way you get the best teams in the finals series.
Given our season behind system, two better teams could qualify.
Lastly A-League teams need the money that the new ACL system will generate for clubs.
Plus, Australia is a market that ACL wants to develop.
The main criteria which determined that Australia only got 2 places was a requirement that only a maximum of one third of a leagues teams could participate in the ACl. Which seems pretty reasonable to me. So with an eight team comp we were entitled to 2.6 teams which was obviously rounded down. If the expansion to 10 had gone ahead then we could possibly have had an extra team. My understanding is that these criteria will be reviewed in 2 years. So hopefully we will get an extra place then
Gee you guys give in easy.
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