history of the A-league (part 1)

The Australian league of football (A-league) is only 5 years old begining in 2004, it was born out of the N.S.L (national soccer league). The first season or version as it called began with eight teams including one New Zealand team.

The eight original teams were Sydney F.C, Melbourne Victory, Queensland Roar, Perth Glory, New Zealand Knights, Adelaide United, Newcaslte Jets and Central Coast Mariners.

New Zealand's only team began with a shaky start to the A-league. After claiming the wooden spoon in the first a-league season and continuing bad performaces in the 2nd season. Rumurs started to surface that the FFA was planning on revoking the Knights licence due to poor attendance and performaces. The rumurs proved correct and it seemed the team would be replaced after the teams licence was revoked. However property developer Terry Serepisos single handly saved New Zealand soccer, paying to make the team a franchise in Wellington. And thus NewZealand Knights was reborn and became Wellington Phoenix.

Sydney F.C also known as the glamor club. Did not come directly out of N.S.L which had three Sydney based teams. All of which were divided racially Sydney City (Jewish team) Sydney United (Croatian) and Sydney Olympic (Greek). When the A-league was established there could only be one team per city. This was to stop the racial rivalry. Sydney got off to a great start winning the first season. They are still the closest team to defending there title coming third in the second season, Sydney might have done better but was deducted points for going over the salary cap the previous year.

Melbourne Victory A.K.A the big V is the most successful team in the history of the league. Becoming the first and only team to win the championship twice. The team also has a very inconsistent record coming seventh in the first season and came fifth in the third season. Melbourne is also a team with big rivalry's one with Sydney F.C which spawed in addition with the city rivialry which has existed for over 100years with matches between the teams consisting of bitterness and fighting. the other rivialry is between Adelaide United, in both of Melbournes winning years they faced Adelaide to take the cup in the 06/07 grand final a humililating 6-0 the second time round 08/09 it was only 1-0.

(The season starts late in the year usually August due to competition over grounds with other codes of football such as rugby it finishes in February. The current champions Melbourne Victory would are therefore discribed as the 08/09 champions.)

round one of a-league season 5

Round one of the a-league and the first game was an upset as central coast confidently defeat the a-league champs Melbourne victory. The game had its share of drama with Kevin Muscat getting injured missing out on the next four games. Ernie Merrick (Melbourne’s coach) looked on angrily looked on angrily as Melbourne get off to a bad start. As one of the most successful teams Melbourne is also the most inconsistent, they conceded there first goal early from a free kick finished off by Matt Simon in the 10th minute. The second goal came from Michael McGLinchy but took a deflection from Rody Vargas to make an own goal on the 15th.

Central Coast Mariners 2 Melbourne Victory 0

The second match saw Sydney FC playing newly formed North Queensland Fury. Sydney took the lead within 3minutes with a brilliant strike by John Alosi. Sydney doubled up with great piece of individual work by Kofi Danning. The first half seemed to belong to Sydney but Fury proved their determination by scoring just before 45 minutes. Jason Spagnuolo.
Queensland dominated the start of the second half controlling possession. New captain Robbie fowler took advantage of a penalty conceded by Sydney evening up the score. However by the 72nd minute Queensland made a mistake in the box conceding the second penalty in the game. Alosi came to the plate and delivered yet again. The fans were particularly happy Alosi had scored two goals as it equalled his record for the entire 08/09 season.

Sydney F.C 3 North Queensland Roar 2