New Adelaide defender Iain Fyfe is delighted to be back in the city he grew up in following four seasons with Sydney FC and can’t wait for the new Hyundai A-League season to start.
Fyfe signed a three-year deal with the Reds and brings much-needed experience to United’s defence, which lost seasoned campaigners Sasa Ognenovski, Angelo Costanzo and Michael Valkanis in the off-season.
“I had a good stint in Sydney, I enjoyed my time and my football there, but ultimately when the opportunity came up to come back here I jumped at it,” Fyfe said.
“It was great to come back amongst family, friends, and also amongst ‘Viddie’ (coach Aurelio Vidmar) and some of the other coaches that I used to play with, so it-s a good environment for me.”
Vidmar and Fyfe were team-mates at Adelaide City in the NSL and while their relationship will be different now, Fyfe is excited about playing under arguably one of the best coaches in Australia.
“Obviously it-s a little bit different. He has to go into that coach role now so it-s a bit different from when he was a team-mate, but Viddie has always been a great bloke and what he-s been able to do as a coach in forming this team into a title contender, was another reason that I came here,” Fyfe said.
At 27 years of age, Fyfe still has plenty of football ahead of him, but he is now the club’s oldest defender and hopes his experience and leadership will help the younger players in the team.
“I’m going to enjoy my football, number one, but ultimately we-re going to be judged on results as a team and we-re going to be judged on not conceding many goals, and with me being the oldest at the back, I-m willing to put my hand up and lead by example,” Fyfe said.
“We-ve lost three experienced defenders in Valkanis, Ognenovski and Costanzo and they were great players, but the club-s got to move on and players have got to step up and that-s what I-m looking to do.”
“The main thing is that we don-t drop off the level that the team maintained last year. It-s going to be hard with two more teams coming into the league and more games, but we-ve got great characters here and it-s up to us as a team to step up and maintain that level.”
Fyfe has represented Australia at Under 23, 20, and 17 level and earning a Socceroos cap is something he is still striving for.
“It-s obviously a goal of mine. First and foremost I want to concentrate on playing good football with Adelaide and getting results,” he said.
“I don-t want to look too far ahead, so my main goal is to play good football for the fans and hopefully win a league title here. After that, you never know. A lot of boys here played good football, got results and got recognised so I-m looking to go down those same lines.”
Adelaide begins the new season with a home match against Perth on August 7.
