How Will The Wellington Phoenix Cope With Alex Rufer’s Injury?
When Alex Rufer was helped off the park during the first half of the Wellington Phoenix’s defeat against Brisbane Roar – snapping the seven-game unbeaten streak that has reinvigorated their season – it wasn’t immediately clear that something serious had happened.
Rufer had rushed out after a Ben Waine shot had been blocked to try and prevent the Roar from attacking in transition. It’s his job to shut down those counter attacks nice and early, though in this case he was kinda hasty in jumping into a challenge against Rahmat Akbari. Clear free kick. In fact Roof was even booked for the tackle. Turns out that yellow card was the least of his worries at that point.
There wasn’t anything in his expression to suggest that he’d done genuine damage, despite instantly clutching at his knee. However he only managed two steps after getting back to his feet before dropping back to all-fours and beginning to crawl towards the sideline (it was pretty weird). The physio came out and they tried extending his leg out a few times, then Rufer chucked his arm over his shoulder and was assisted off the park to be replaced by Nick Pennington.
At the time it looked like maybe a dead leg. Or maybe some heavy bruising from the clash with Akbari. However in hindsight everything there checks the boxes of an ACL injury, which is what the club confirmed a few days later once the scans had come back. Terrible outcome. The Welly Nix captain will undergo surgery in 4-6 weeks (evidence suggests it’s better not to go under the knife too soon after an ACL tear) and the recovery period is normally somewhere in that 9-12 month range... meaning that it’s unlikely that Alex Rufer is playing football again until midway through the next A-League season.
Above all, this is just devastating for Rufer who also had a long stint on the sidelines earlier in his career after a broken leg. He’d been in excellent, resurgent form during that unbeaten streak and is one of five players to have started each of the first 14 games of the A-League season (as well as tying with David Ball for the most minutes played during the FFA Cup run). A key player. The captain of the team. An important part of the club’s positive recent results. Will not play again this season. Here’s to a speedy recovery and an eventual return to exactly where he left off.
Ufuk Talay: “We really feel for Alex as he has been playing some of his best football in recent weeks. It’s also a major setback for the team to lose their captain midway through the season. Alex has grown into a fantastic leader and will be missed, but it’s an opportunity for other players to step up in his absence.”
When you’ve got a bloke who has started every single game this season, there’s going to be a pretty significant flow-on effect. An important cog in the machine needs to be replaced and it’s notable that even when the Nix midfield was struggling earlier... at no point did Ufuk Talay veer away from the Clayton Lewis + Alex Rufer duo. On the one hand he always believed in their ability to make it work (which has since proved to be yet another astute bit of scouting from Uffie) and on the other hand it probably hinted at a weakness in depth in those positions.
Because Clayton Lewis is also in that five-man crew to have started every game. The others are:
David Ball, who has played up front or out wide and on both sides
Tim Payne, who has alternated between centre-back and right-back
And Josh Laws, who has kept it steady at CB but with a couple different partners and a couple of different left-backs outside of him
Meanwhile Lewis + Rufer has been an ever-present combo. There have of course been times when each of them has been subbed off. Nick Pennington has gotten plenty of minutes from those situations plus there have been times when, chasing a late goal, a midfielder has been sacrificed for an extra attacking option. But it’s always been those two from the start (except for a couple FFA Cup games in which Lewis was partnered by Pennington – once because Rufer was rested, once because Rufer played CB).
The dynamic duo was already going to be broken up on Friday night against Newcastle because Clayton Lewis is away with the All Whites. Now not only will that be the first A-League game in which that partnership is snapped but it’s not gonna involve either of them. From both to neither in one fell swoop. Then when Lewis gets back from international duty he’s gonna need to find a new buddy to see him (and the whole damn team) through the rest of this season... a season which is now looking more likely than not to include at least one finals game.
The obvious – and correct – answer to that riddle is that it’ll be Nick Pennington who steps into the first eleven. Pennington has had to be pretty patient since signing from Italy. He’s started a couple cup games alongside Lewis already though all of his nine ALM games have come off the bench. Pennington is a good, tidy player. He’s got solid positional awareness and impressive technical ability. Had expected him to be a better passer than he’s shown so far but a lot of that could be more about the situations he’s found himself playing in. Let him loose from the start and he should be all good.
Even so, these things aren’t all about individual abilities, they’re also about combinations. Rufer and Lewis may have taken some time to figure theirs out but they were worth persevering with because of how well they mix together. Two hard workers, two guys who look for a progressive pass... but also one is left-footed and one is right-footed, one is more of an attacker, one is more of a defensive enforcer. They accentuate each other’s strengths and cover each other’s weaknesses. Gael Sandoval’s arrival was the trigger for the form flip but the difference in performance from the HeNix’s two starting midfielders might well have been the difference between the results.
Nick Pennington is a lot more Lewis than Rufer based on what we’ve seen from him so far. He’s not going to assert himself as that defensive shield in the way that Rufer does at his best and that could expose the back four to more of what we saw them struggling to deal with at the start of things. Scott Wootton helps those matters but still. Chances are we see Lewis slip into more of a defensive role when he returns. Which is okay, he can do that. He’s actually made more tackles than Rufer so far (14 vs 13)... although he’s nowhere near Rufer in interceptions (31 vs 17). Those two are 1 & 2 in the team for both those stats btw.
Except if Lewis is dropping deeper then you miss out on a lot of his best attributes, like picking out attacking third passes and swinging in crosses. Should still get set piece duty but the Nix had better have their transition defence cooking there just in case. Alternatively Pennington might be amazing and the shift in midfield balance won’t be a drama at all. Nobody knew what Cammy Devlin was like until he got a run of games. Could be that NP inspires the Nix to start dominating possession and carving teams apart from the base of their dual pivots. That’s being optimistic. But the concern is valid.
Pennington’s not really the worry though, the worry is this weekend with Lewis unavailable... and any subsequent games that Lewis or Pennington might miss the rest of the way. It was the injection of a couple of new dudes who sparked the revival – adding the import-level class of Sandoval and Wootton – so it stands to reason that taking a couple guys out of the line-up could have the opposite effect. ‘Tis a fine balance, this football thing.
Who else can play midfield? Well there are a few options but they all happen to be tied up right now thus it’ll cause a domino effect to pick any of them. Josh Laws has the necessary defensive instincts plus he moves the ball nicely. He’s a midfielder by trade, remember. But picking him means having to break up what’s been a very successful back four. When Talay has started with Payne/Wootton/Laws/Sutton, the Nix have conceded six goals in six games with two clean sheets. Every other combination has allowed 16 goals in eight games with zero clean sheets.
Unfortunately the other two standout options are from the exact same quartet: Tim Payne and Sam Sutton. There is at least more depth in the fullback areas thanks to Louis Fenton, Callan Elliot, and James McGarry (if fit). But it’d still be breaking up a great back four. Granted, Tim Payne is going to miss a couple games anyway when he joins up with the All Whites after the Newcastle match. Maybe we jump the gun and let Louis Fenton take over a week earlier with Payne in midfield (or at CB with Laws at CM)? Payne is probably below the other two on the depth chart but he is the most commanding defender of the three backups.
Sutton, meanwhile, like Laws, has always been a midfielder coming up the grades. This is his preferred role – perhaps not quite to CDM extents but his work at LB proves he’s got the skills for it. Having said that he’s also the least experienced of the trio and with three assists to his name this season has emerged as one of the team’s better attacking outlets while at left-back so whether you want to mess with that formula is a matter for debate. Again, with any of those options you’re not only changing the midfield but you’re altering the backline as well. Dominoes.
He’s not available this week due to his maiden senior international call-up... but Ben Old could be a smokey option down the line in case of injury or suspension. It’s not his natural game but he does have a lot of the characteristics needed to do a job there. Just chucking that one out there because there really isn’t anyone else in the current squad who can. Short of a bit of Ufuk Talay magic, that is. He’s done well when converting players to new positions before (see: Timothy J. Payne & Samuel H. Sutton).
Should mention Jackson Manuel here too. He was one of the academy blokes flown over earlier in the season (along with Finn Surman and Oskar van Hattum) so he’s been training with the first team for months now. Manuel made his National League debut at age 14 a couple years back which is surely a record (born in 2003). Had a year with Tasman United in there too. He mostly played as a fullback in those Natty League games but has been a defensive midfielder at other levels so he’s gotta be an option. The only player with the team right now who has yet to make a matchday squad but he’s obviously just moved up the pecking order by a spot so his time may be soon. Fresh… but that hasn’t stopped Ufuk Talay before.
Could they sign someone else? Yes... but the mid-season transfer window closed a month ago so they’re very limited. Highly unlikely to be able to touch the empty visa spot for example. But if a target is a free agent who wasn’t registered to another pro club when the window closed then they still have that wiggle room. Get the feeling this would have happened by now if it was going to, though.
There’s also the academy pathway. Several dudes have already been called up since the season began including Oskar van Hattum who has wiggled his way into five consecutive matchday squads prior to missing the last couple with injury. But there’s not a lot going on within the midfield stocks at this moment. Luis Toomey would be the best bet to fly over but he’s more of an attacking midfielder. Manny Achol just signed with FK Auda in Latvia (after spending some time with Steven Taylor at Gulf United in Dubai). Henry Hamilton has left for a scholarship at the University of Maryland. Fin Conchie’s the other guy who got decent South Central Series minutes in midfield. Pretty young... but who knows?
All of these are interesting tangents but under Uffie’s management the Wellington Phoenix have excelled at problem solving. They tend to figure these yarns out. The bigger worry is the one for which there is no solution: Alex Rufer being ruled out for the rest of the season. The loss of the captain and the loss of a key player.
A recurring theme on our podcasts recently has been squad depth. The NBA is in the middle of a season where covid protocols have meant that every team has had to deal with constant ins and outs. Even in a shortened 2020-21 season, only 11 NBA players featured in every regular season game which was the lowest total since the league moved to an 82-game schedule in 1967-68. There’s still a month to go in the current season and there are only about six or seven left. The NRL season has just kicked off with wider squads likely to be more important than ever. The Blackcaps have impressively grown out their pool of international calibre players over recent years (although it might have caught up with them a bit with key players missing during a pair of Test defeats over the home summer). Squad depth is essential if you’re going to survive a long, gruelling season.
That’s where the Welly Nix are at the moment. They can probably handle the loss of Rufer without a major drop off in results... but this nudges them one absentee closer to the point where they won’t be able to deal with it. Another midfield injury, for example, and the cupboard will be looking rather bare.
They’ve been able to handle Gary Hooper missing time so far. Reno Piscopo has had a couple pesky injuries. The more players missing the smaller the margin for error becomes but so far they’ve been able to cope with what’s come their way. Difference is that Hooper and Piscopo keep coming back whereas Rufer is done for the campaign. It’s Next Man Up mentality as always... just, you know, let’s hope there aren’t any more long-termers where this one came from.
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