Ernie! Fourth Will Do Just Fine, Thanks

Let’s just hope we don’t end up in a penalty shootout next week.

It’s a shame we didn’t grab that second spot, but all it means is that we’ll have to win an extra game to win the title. Yeah, okay, that’s no small matter. But one game at a time and we now know what the task will be. The Nix play Melbourne City, 7pm on Sunday at Westpac Stadium. If you live in Wellington or are within driving/flying/sailing/hitchhiking distance, then you owe it to yourself, to the sport of football, and to your designated religion to be there. No excuses, it’s the freakin’ playoffs.

Against Sydney, the lads may have lost but they still showed the kind of dominating, flowing attack that has made them so good this season. Not nearly at the rapid level they finished with last game, though still enough to give us hope that they keep this up and the goals will come – hopefully next week or else it’ll probably be too late. Still, this was also with several key guys rested. Krishna dropped to the bench with Fenton playing wide right up front, Glen Moss got the rest and Vince Lia started too.

A few guys were off the pace a bit. Burnsy and Roly always look dangerous but were a step below what they can do. Riera didn’t run the show as he can do and Fenton won’t be reprising this attacking role next week based on this show. Playing at fullback means his kinda limited attacking play is out to its best use yet as a forward, his inability to get past defenders is a big problem given that’s how guys like Wee Mac, Burnsy, Roly and Roy have had so much success. Speaking of Wee Mac, he was outstanding. Especially early on where he was near unplayable, winning the penalty even.

Yeah, the penalty. This could have been a very different game had Roly Bonevacia been able to convert. Instead he slid his effort past the post to the left hand side. Missing the target – the cardinal sin of penalty taking. That was our eighth spot kick of the season and we’ve scored only three of them. That’s so far from unacceptable that it ain’t even funny. Roly hadn’t taken any of those previous ones, not that it’s shocking that Ernie called up a new soldier. Burnsy took our last effort and missed it away to Melly City in a game that ended 0-0. He did score one back in his hat-trick game at least. Roy Krishna scored one earlier in the season, he was on the bench, while the other guy to score from the spot was Jeremy Brockie. Yup. Stay on your feet from now on, lads, that way seems to work better. Roly’s miss put a dampener on what had been a strong first 10 minutes, suddenly the air went out of the balloon.

Of course Sydney then went straight down the other end and scored. Of course they’d get a penalty later on and Nix oldboy Shane Smeltz would bury it. Of course. Boxall pulled one back after half time and that was about all.

By the end of the game, it actually got to where a loss was gonna be better than a draw. Avoid the equaliser and it meant Melly City instead of Brisbane. We’ve beaten each of them at home this season but on current form it’s the team that’s hasn’t won since March and just got thrashed by Adelaide you’d prefer over the team that’s won 3 of 4 and has a notoriously good record at Westpac (we beat them 3-0 earlier in the season, our first over the Roar in 5 home games, dating back to 2012).

We can’t complain about missing second place. Having the bye through what are effectively quarter finals would’ve been huge, but whatever. We’ll do it the hard way if we have to.

Who Are Ya? Yo, Wee Mac, a little more where that came from matey! We know for absolute certain that City are gonna target Nathan Burns next week. Roly too, most probably. So if we can get McGlinchey playing with pace and incision then he may just be a game-breaker.

Nek Week… You all know what the deal is.