Some of the Isuzu UTE A-League’s big names are feeling the pressure as last weeks of the season come into view, writes Tom Smithies
Scientists reckon that stress can accentuate your taste buds, so breakfast should be a particularly flavoursome experience this weekend in A-League coaching households across the country.
Whether they lead clubs who can muster only jam on toast, or the more affluent outfits tucking into smashed avocado and feta, there’s a sense that the marathon of a whole season is distilling down to crunch time.
With just five weeks left of the regular season by the time this weekend’s games are over, the tightness of the table seems to narrow like a funnel – and the prospects are starting to look a little sweat-enducing for some of the self-described biggest clubs in the competition.
By Sunday night we could see – pending a very conceivable set of results – a gathering of Sydney FC, Melbourne Victory and Western Sydney nestled outside the top six and separated by just two points. Ahead of them could sit the likes of Adelaide, the Central Coast, Newcastle and Wellington, all making a big deal out of smaller budgets.
To be fair, if the dominoes fall another way, Sydney FC and Melbourne Victory could also be third and fourth by the time the weekend is drawing to a close – that’s the madness of the league table and the narrowness of the margins. No one can afford to right off any fixture when so many teams have aspirations to make the top six.
If it seems harsh to personalise what is a team sport, part of the fascination over the next few weeks will be to see how coaches handle the subtle differences of pressure when their immediate aim is just to reinforce their finals hopes – what at the start of the season would have been seen as barely par.
Conversely, as the finish line appears on the horizon, there are others in hotseats who face a test of nerve as the temptation to look down could yet undermine the hire-wire act of getting to this stage of the season in an unexpected position of strength.
For the likes of Steve Corica and Tony Popovic, it wasn’t supposed to be this way. Corica’s coaching debut has so far delivered an unprecedented three consecutive grand finals, two of them won, while Popovic was given the Victory club cheque book and told to get them back to the top of the table. All of that makes the current mid-table water treading all the more engrossing.
Corica has more to be concerned about, having played three more games for no more points, and Sydney face the added burden of navigating a rushed trip to Qatar to play the Asian Champions League in a rapid-fire series of games, before returning to complete the A-League season.
In that sense, Victory’s ACL exit at the hands of Vissel Kobe had a silver lining, giving them more breathing space, but their form is underwhelming. A trip to Adelaide is hardly the sort of game to grasp at to reignite this campaign, especially with Carl Veart’s side eager to shore up third place. So far Popovic as a coach has been synonymous with instant success, but the lack of conviction in this Victory side is intriguing.
You could hardly say that of Western United, deep into a two-horse race for the Premier’s Plate with Melbourne City. For a coach who made his name by scoring goals, John Aloisi has built this campaign on not conceding them – just 20 in 19 games so far, and a quarter of those have come in the last two games. Is that the first signs of nerves, or a blip? United open the weekend by hosting the Mariners, the only side they have not yet faced this season, and the outcome may tell us much about both sides.
In fact the dominoes are wobbling up and down the table – beyond just this weekend, we have Melbourne City hosting Sydney FC on Wednesday and then a Melbourne derby next Saturday, with the fall-out affecting many more teams.
Coaches tend to be creatures of routine, and matchday breakfast gives them all plenty to consider over their breakfast of choice.
