Preseason is a torturous thing, it’ll end up being around 80 days from the first ball kicked in Shepparton to the first tackle made in anger in the derby, from a personel point of view, it looks to have been a largely positive off-season, John van’t Schip has come back on board as somewhat of a mentor for Aloisi, hopefully he can help foster a new set of talented youngsters through the clubs ranks, in fairness Walker, Mauk and Mitchinson have all signed there first senior contracts and its promising to see all of these boys being rewarded for their hard work last year with a crack at senior spots this year, they’ll all be called upon to do their job at different stages and will no doubt do it admirably.
The latest signing of Michael Mifsud (and the hinted signing of injury replacement, Andrea Migliorini) rounds out the Melbourne Heart squad for this year, so its worth taking a look at who we’ve taken on board this year, and whose moved on.
In
Iain Ramsay
Massimo Murdocca
Harry Kewell
Rob Wielaert
Aziz Behich
Tando Velaphi
Patrick Kisnorbo
Andrea Migliorini
Orlando Engelaar*
Michael Mifsud
*if you need to know why there’s an asterisk here, you’ve not been paying enough attention.
We’ve added a lot of experience this year, we’ve added 341 games of A-League experience in addition to the 934 games of experience throughout Europe, now while these seem like arbitrary numbers (they most certainly are) its worth noting that most of these games, in the case of Wielaert, Kisborbo, Kewell and a lesser extent Mifsud have come at a very high level in Europe, this will add experience that will prove invaluable to the teams performance this year, in addition to the next crop of Melbourne Heart youngsters, which should be given every opportunity to develop there skills beside these men. It also provides quality to the spine of the team, which is where we lacked a sense of authority last year, especially away from home.
Out
Matt Thompson
Simon Colosimo
Marcel Meeuwis
Josip Tadic
Eli Babalj
Richard Garcia
While we’ve lost some serious experience, if this trade of players was offered at the end of last season, I think most supporters and likely the first team management would have taken it with very few questions asked, the major loss from this list, Richard Garcia, has been replaced by Kewell and Ramsay, which at the very least, seems like a fairly good trade off. While it still remains to be seen how all of these new players gel together, there’s been a fairly large turnover at a lot of the top clubs this season, affording Heart fans the chance to dream of a top few finish. Its probably worth noting that some of the rhetoric coming out of the club has been wonderfully positive, with Aziz Behich, Michael Mifsud and Harry Kewell brining a mentality of wanting to win a title, while its doubtless that all of the previous players to play for Heart have had the intention of doing so, its great to see these men expressing it. This has also put the future of a number of players into question, while we’ve lost around 4-5 starting players from an ideal line-up, we’ve probably added 7-8 who’d be expecting a starting berth this year, which will provide a healthy set of competition, there’s still room for youngsters to push their way into the first team, it should be an earned right, not a forced hand as it was last year.
For a better look at the turnover that Melbourne Heart underwent last year, lets look at the teams which started and finished last year. For our first game last year we ran out with:
Bolton
Marrone Colosimo Gerhardt Behich
Thompson Garcia
Duganzic Fred Williams
Macallister
While we ended the season with:
Bolton*
Coyne Colosimo Gerhardt Mitchinson
Thompson Meeuwis
Williams Garcia Garrucio
Tadic
And its worth noting that Bolton was playing his last game and the finals were out of reach, Jeremy Walker had established himself as the first choice right back, while Jonathon Germano was in neither of these teams he started, Mebrahtu was probably our top attacking outlet towards the back end of the season and David Vrankovic had started a fair few games. Ultimately this instability in our line up and the propensity of the coaching staff to stick with the system (either due to stubborn tactical rigour, or due to a lack of personnel, depending which side of the fence you fall on). This year the team will look even more different, with two players currently penciled in for starting berths that played at this time last year, Patrick Gerhardt and Aziz Behich, while David Williams and Mate Duganzic will be fighting with a host of other talented wingers for the two wide spots. Having the full compliment of players and a set of internationals who will all vie for a starting spot (I’m looking at you Steven Gray) gives the team a lot more depth straight from the outset. It will also allow (and hopefully to a degree, force) John Aloisi to consider other formations outside of the current rigid 4-2-3-1 formation that we’ve seen all of last year. Given there will be a lot of strength in the centre half position (between Wielaert, Kisnorbo, Vrankovic and Gerhardt) there is likely to be a very unlucky player week to week, now while injuries and suspensions play a role, its likely that in last years system one of these players misses out each week (with the proviso that Gerhardt plays some serious minutes in the middle of the park, which depends hugely on new signing Andrea Migliorini) which depending upon the make up of the midfield, which at this stage is anyones guess, could easily lead to the adoption of a 5 – 4 – 1, which could be played as follows.
Redmayne
Gerhardt Kisnorbo Wielaert
Walker Murdocca Behich
Duganzic Kewell Ramsay
Mifsud
There are several reasons I like this formation, firstly it utilises our strengths, quality wingers and a glut of good centre halves and while personnel shouldn’t guide every tactical decision it would also allow more freedom for Behich to get forward which would prove extremely useful with the pace provided by Ramsay also on the left hand side, while Walker isn’t a marauding full back, he’s played some midfield and his control on the ball has been good when called upon so far in his short career. It also allows for both Ramsay and Duganzic to play closer to Mifsud, which would be especially vital if our interplay leads to the delivery that we saw to Tadic and Babalj last year, which would be somewhat of a disaster, the formation easily adapts with the move of Gerhardt into the midfield and Behich and Walker to traditional full back positions. Given the likelihood that most teams will play with a lone striker this year, this would allow for a better ability to combat different systems, something that we seemed to struggle with at times, especially on the road, last year.
Bring on the season.
All Heart 