#WellyNix – First Impressions of the Kalezic Era
Or maybe that should be the Kalezic & Vidosic era. All the official missives tend to prefers ‘coaches’ to ‘coach’, which probably means that Vido’s getting a hefty pay cheque each week and thus requires the necessary recognition. Eh, fair enough. Can’t say he wasn’t a good get and he even came with a free top goalscorer!
When Vido Jr put that header away five minutes in it seemed like we were in for golden times at the Wellington Phoenix. It was strangely reminiscent of the goal the All Whites scored, actually. Roy Krishna doing a Marco Rojas in pouncing on the loose ball with a decisive first touch, taking it to the line past a defender or two and chipping one elegantly towards the far post for the header. Might be one of the few times Young Vido ever gets compared to Chris Wood but good for him. The Nix were 1-0 up and Adelaide hadn’t even touched the ball in their half yet.
Oh how naïve we were. Basking in those summer days as if the winter would never come. Sipping on the nectar of Dionysus with no thought of the hangover to follow. Wasting away our youth in cursed ignorance… point being that the Phoenix followed that perfect five minutes with 85 very disjointed ones, settling eventually for a 1-1 draw against Adelaide United which at least gets them a point on the board but with away trips coming up against Sydney and Melbourne City it really woulda been nice to win.
But then what did you expect? The Niche Cache preview of the team was basically about how they’re impossible to judge right now, what with some rather drastic player and management turnover since the last season - a season which ended almost six month ago, she’s a long break between games and even longer when you don’t make the playoffs.
New players take time to settle into their new clubs. That’s obvious, everybody knows that. But it really can’t be stressed enough with this current Nix team. Not only are they working with a new coach(/ing team) but they’re almost working with a new team full-stop.
Kalezic and Vidosic Sr are one thing. However the team that started against ADL featured seven players making their A-League club debuts, plus two returning players who were far from regulars last season as well. Only Roy Krishna and Marco Rossi were familiar faces in 2016-17. Just two players. No bloody wonder they didn’t really click then.
Ali Abbas, Marco Rossi, Dan Mullen and Scott Galloway were all at different clubs last time out. Keegan Smith is 18 years old and wasn’t even expected to be on the bench a month ago. Considering that you’ve gotta say that they did pretty well to only concede once and you can give a lot of credit for that to Goran Paracki. He brought some real industry as the most defensive midfielder and showed a bit of flash with a few of those turns out of trouble too. No surprises that he’s one of the new signings who’s been there the longest – playing in that FFA Cup game at the start of August with Galloway. There are so many new parts to this machine which will need time to install.
Part of that was, naturally, enforced by the international window which meant Mike McGlinchey, Andy Durante and Tom Doyle were all unavailable. All three could presumably come back in for next week, which would add some familiarity to the team for sure. Durante will be the starting central defender next to Rossi. He’s the club captain and still an essential presence there. Doyle has some serious competition from Ali Abbas although Abbas, having started promisingly, didn’t have his best game against Adelaide so there’s a decision to be made there. And McGlinchey probably replaces Matt Ridenton in the XI. Three players who’ve been around for a long time at the club, they’ll make a big difference. Don’t forget that Gui Finkler was injured as well.
However while those changes were forced, Keegan Smith (aka Sid the Neighbour from Toy Story) still got picked outta nowhere. An 18 year old fresh from the ressies chucked right on in for the first game of the season. Dunno what Lewis Italiano did wrong but he was never the most glamorous replacement for Mossy, it was already a bit of a shock they didn’t try find a new goalkeeper in the transfer market. Apparently they didn’t need to.
Smith showed some nerves rushing out on a couple crosses. He fumbled a few and punched one or two that he should’ve caught. But while they looked messy he didn’t actually bugger anything up. It was funny that Marco Rossi ended up taking the goal kicks because Smith didn’t have the distance in his boots and he definitely looked a little young in that big jersey but if you look at the end results he did a great job. This was a fantastic save here, for one:
That Kalezic was willing to throw a teenaged goalie in there despite already having six new signings starting in the outfield shows plenty of courage. Plenty of risk too but what is courage without risk? It’s not flippin’ courage, that’s for sure. Watching how the Nix struggled to manufacture their attacks, seeing Kaludjerovic fail to get involved in most of the play, seeing passes sprayed forward at the expense of possession… we already knew this might take a few games and here was the proof. But Kalezic isn’t about to piss around trying to ease the transition. He’s here now and we’re starting with all the chips on the table.
A Few More Stray Thoughts:
At what point did Ali Abbas think it’d be a good idea to close down Nikola Mileusnic before the cross for the Adelaide goal? It was his poor clearance that led to the chance and he just stood there and watching him whip in the assist. Come on, bro.
Alex Rufer’s bulked up, aye? Or had a growth spurt of something. He’s capable of throwing himself around a bit now and he already had the skills with the ball at his feet. Still, he’s probably a bit raw for that crucial attacking mid area, where he’s gotta be the playmaker. Well, he doesn’t, because Professor Fink will be coming back in soon. It’ll be super interesting to see how Rufer (and Ridenton too) goes this season with a more prominent squad role. He’s one of the main middle-fingers to the ‘didn’t sign any new kiwis’ idea – the kiwis are already there now they’ve gotta force their way through.
The Nix haven’t beaten Adelaide for six games now.
Don’t think we learned a damn thing about Kaludjerovic here. He just didn’t get anything to do. Vidosic worked hard getting back on defence and Krishna was predictably Welly’s most dangerous attacker, always good signs, but the main striker was out of things. Not really his fault. A mere 24 touches in 89 minutes, did get a couple shots off though.
70.2% passing accuracy for the game, 54.3% accuracy in the Adelaide half. That’s what’s meant with all that disjointed, sloppy chatter. The combinations are all new and players aren’t yet used to each other’s trends and tendencies. The coach(es) can only instil so much.
Kinda felt like the two best chances outside the goal fell to Marco Rossi and he buggered ‘em both up. That chest and volley which he needed to hit a touch sooner and the header that he blasted over. Hard not to feel that Kaludjerovic or Vidosic woulda done a lot better with them.
Matt Ridenton on set pieces. With Finkler and McGlinchey to return, don’t get used to that.
What are the odds on Keegan Smith getting an All Whites nod in November? They’ll be long but Glen Moss was on the bench for Newcastle this week and we know Uncle Tony doesn’t like benchwarmers (except for when he does), plus Ollie Sail got a call-up not so long ago and Smith has blasted that bloke off the map in the last week. He doesn’t even have a profile on the Phoenix website these days… then again it looks like Sid’s has been rushed up without a second glance too:
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