Who's signed for next season

[EdDog]

People forget we almost had kuranyi until his family put breaks on the deal

Almost players are no good to us unfortunately.

I'm sure we could have "almost" won the premiership again if we had not completely ballsed up our recruitment this season.

[Stuckey]

People forget we almost had kuranyi until his family put breaks on the deal

Almost players are no good to us unfortunately.

I'm sure we could have "almost" won the premiership again if we had not completely ballsed up our recruitment this season.

Yeah that's it really. It seems like the club went after Kuranyi with little or no true back up plan in place. IMO that's very representative of this season. When things aren't going well the club seems to just keep trying the same thing.

[The Claw]

Plenty of people voiced serious concerns around the time we lost to Redlands about our outs and few ins at that time. The lack of recruiting and the time it was taking.
Club then signed guns like Makarounas (who has proved how crap he really is at AU after not needing to prove anything on that front), then last minute Henrique (Why), Guardiola and Holland.
None of these guys fit the "philosophy" of AU in the last few years and none worked out, none proved to better than what was lost.
What is truly idiotic is saying that the football director is not a major part of the problem when he only got Mauk (City wanted Malik) and Garuccio as successes out of the numerous other signings made under his watch. The worst part he is then quoted as saying Amor has not done enough to warrant a new contract, yet what has he done to warrant keeping his own job.......
Whole club is is a state of shite on so many levels. They will be lucky to get 5-6 k on Friday and with so many players off contract, I'd imagine we will have a new team again next season.

Its funny how Victory get Jason Geria with euro offers, yet manage to convince him to sign on. Here at AU, as soon as any offer is received they are gone - Pissant vs Ambitious and that's why Troisi is playing there and not here.

[Stuckey]

Plenty of people voiced serious concerns around the time we lost to Redlands about our outs and few ins at that time. The lack of recruiting and the time it was taking.
Club then signed guns like Makarounas (who has proved how crap he really is at AU after not needing to prove anything on that front), then last minute Henrique (Why), Guardiola and Holland.
None of these guys fit the "philosophy" of AU in the last few years and none worked out, none proved to better than what was lost.
What is truly idiotic is saying that the football director is not a major part of the problem when he only got Mauk (City wanted Malik) and Garuccio as successes out of the numerous other signings made under his watch. The worst part he is then quoted as saying Amor has not done enough to warrant a new contract, yet what has he done to warrant keeping his own job.......
Whole club is is a state of shite on so many levels. They will be lucky to get 5-6 k on Friday and with so many players off contract, I'd imagine we will have a new team again next season.

Its funny how Victory get Jason Geria with euro offers, yet manage to convince him to sign on. Here at AU, as soon as any offer is received they are gone - Pissant vs Ambitious and that's why Troisi is playing there and not here.

Victory make more money than some AFL clubs. Comparing how they operate to AU is like comparing a kid digging a hole in the backyard to BHP.
I don't think the Redlands game was anything to take serious note of at the time. All HAL sides struggle with games at that time of the year as they we're only a week or two into their pre-season. If Euge didn't make that error no one would be talking about that game.
But I agree. Ante must also be held accountable.

[View From The Top]

And how do you think Victory got in to that position? They got there by being successful. Sure they have a larger market to draw upon, but they still have to attract support, and they understand that to gain and keep support they have to be successful. They do not go through the biennial meltdowns and rebuilds that AUFC have. They have stability, good management and planning, none of which seems to be in the DNA at United. And they don't take their supporters for granted.

[ChillyPhilly]

Victory have had multiple meltdowns over the past half decade, and it's been ugly.

[The Claw]

What Victory have always done well at is locking down there up and coming players, they seem to stay a lot longer than a good young player at AU. I.e. there is no way in hell that Kmauu would not have still been at Victory if he was Victory player to begin with. We seem to develop players for every other club than our own.

In HR, they say high staff turnover is a major indicator of culture/ employee satisfaction. If that is the case, the turnover of staff and players at AU in the last 18 months would indicate that almost everyone wants to leave as soon as they can for every reason under the sun (but mostly "family" reasons). Funny how Gombau is back in Australia despite his family issues only 12 months ago, only an issue in Adelaide??

I get we don't have the resources of the big clubs, but we have always been pretty competitive. We have 11 points and are 8 points back from 2nd bottom which highlights we are not even competitive anymore with no sign of that improving.
If Amor goes, a couple of others up top have to follow as they are clearly a big part of the issue.

[The Claw]

And how do you think Victory got in to that position? They got there by being successful. Sure they have a larger market to draw upon, but they still have to attract support, and they understand that to gain and keep support they have to be successful. They do not go through the biennial meltdowns and rebuilds that AUFC have. They have stability, good management and planning, none of which seems to be in the DNA at United. And they don't take their supporters for granted.

Yep this is true. We finally had a platform to boost AU's standing in the state and the only thing left is some timber floating on the ocean.. + they have managed to piss off more supporters/ members than ever before. That's impressive on its own, but to do that in less than 12 months is even more depressing

[Capac]

Personally I'm not as fussed as a lot of other people about this season. Sure I'm disheartened and disappointed about the results this season and i'm incredibly disappointed about the way the club worked the offseason but at the same time we have been in worse positions and come out of it. Plus we just won the double, in the previous two seasons we have won 3 times as many trophies as the previous 10 years of the competition. I think people have to realise that fortunes in a competition like the A League go up and down, we'll be back next year, I'm sure of it. we might need a rebuild but I think a solid foundation is there, as shown by our trophies and the amount of youngsters coming into the senior sides or other A League sides after coming through our system.

We can complain about the Board and management but they have brought us into the most financially stable position we've been in, and they brought in a system after the club had spent years going back and forth, up and down with no ambition. We could blame Kovacevic and say his recruitment has been terrible but he has a good history of bringing good players in (Keogh, Castro, Marinkovic, Mauk) and really only screwed up one window when he was chucked into the deep end and had to change tact half way through the window. We could blame Amor but he has had to deal with a sub par side that lost it's best players and he also just won us the double, which even Gombau was unable to do. We could blame the players but most of them are young an inexperienced and it would be hard coming off a double season and watching everything that could possibly go gwrong happen the next.

The fact is it's a combination of all these factors without any specific person or people to blame. Yeah It's shit and yet i'm upset too, but I have confidence we will come out the other side, plus we have Champions League to look forward too.

[supsup]

I would have settled with a mid-table finish and called it a hangover. What is most disappointing is the complete capitulation.

Not for a second did I expect us to win the lot, but I did expect us to stabilise. The fact we are in the position we are in points to abject failure by someone. Whether that is Amor, Kovacevic or someone else, who knows, but the fact remains it has been a collapse in a league with some very mediocre football teams.

[Jessesdad]

I'm with Capac mainly. It's a bit of a perfect storm. We lose key players, we sign badly or they just don't work out for us, our better players lose form or are injured, other teams work us out, the management and coaching staff seem a bit stale and the young players really need another season to improve. But there are factors that can be controlled and improved. Communication from the club is sporadic and ignores the needs of the fans. Lack of accountability and honesty doesn't sell well to a disgruntled base. Amor has taken responsibility but - let's face it - he's no great communicator at the best of times.

Fans don't need their team to win all the time. Most of us are too realistic to expect that. But....we do need to feel as if we matter. At the moment the ground announcer is about the only one who talks to us.

The day that the club asks every player, every game, to grab a Sharpie and head to the sideline and spend 15 mins with the fans, chatting and signing and having photos I might start to believe that they understand that fans matter. Especially young fans. Kicking or throwing balls at us randomly after a game just doesn't cut it. We're not a security risk. Tim Cahill spent a lot of time after the MC game talking to fans - our fans - and I know he's paid to do it but surely we can manage the same.

There doesn't appear to be anyone in the club who can speak clearly on behalf of the club to those who keep it afloat - us.

They could start by explaining the rationale behind dropping Marrone for the last game. It's a bewildering decision and requires an answer.

[blahblah]

Happy 4th Birthday to this epic thread, started by Stuckey on Feb 14th 2013. Now up to 7257 posts over 484 pages.




For those who are curious it was concerns regarding re-signing players that drove all thoughts of taking the misses out for a delightful Valentine's dinner from Stuckey's mind.

[sevengoals]

Three Cheers!

[Stuckey]

Happy 4th Birthday to this epic thread, started by Stuckey on Feb 14th 2013. Now up to 7257 posts over 484 pages.




For those who are curious it was concerns regarding re-signing players that drove all thoughts of taking the misses out for a delightful Valentine's dinner from Stuckey's mind.

Haha I was probably in the dog house for forgetting another Valentines. So I sat at home and created the never-ending debate on who is signed for next season!

[Stuckey]

Personally I'm not as fussed as a lot of other people about this season. Sure I'm disheartened and disappointed about the results this season and i'm incredibly disappointed about the way the club worked the offseason but at the same time we have been in worse positions and come out of it. Plus we just won the double, in the previous two seasons we have won 3 times as many trophies as the previous 10 years of the competition. I think people have to realise that fortunes in a competition like the A League go up and down, we'll be back next year, I'm sure of it. we might need a rebuild but I think a solid foundation is there, as shown by our trophies and the amount of youngsters coming into the senior sides or other A League sides after coming through our system.

We can complain about the Board and management but they have brought us into the most financially stable position we've been in, and they brought in a system after the club had spent years going back and forth, up and down with no ambition. We could blame Kovacevic and say his recruitment has been terrible but he has a good history of bringing good players in (Keogh, Castro, Marinkovic, Mauk) and really only screwed up one window when he was chucked into the deep end and had to change tact half way through the window. We could blame Amor but he has had to deal with a sub par side that lost it's best players and he also just won us the double, which even Gombau was unable to do. We could blame the players but most of them are young an inexperienced and it would be hard coming off a double season and watching everything that could possibly go gwrong happen the next.

The fact is it's a combination of all these factors without any specific person or people to blame. Yeah It's shit and yet i'm upset too, but I have confidence we will come out the other side, plus we have Champions League to look forward too.

Yes, I honestly believe that the club made a call last season to not force players like Goodwin, McGowan into signing contracts. I think doing so may have forced them into moves abroad sooner and the squad would have been broken up sooner. I think in a number of ways the club really rolled the dice on the playing ground and that gamble obviously paid off handsomely.
But due to not forcing players into signing new deals and allowing Mauk to come here with a very good chance of him leaving soon after, there was always the chance that the club wouldn't recover their squad in time for this season. Which is what has happened. So this season is a symptom of the decisions made last season. So in a way last season probably wouldn't have happened if the club focused on this season too heavily.