Summary: South Melbourne will be sharing the points with Green Gully after their round 20 clash ended 0-0. Both teams created compelling chances throughout the afternoon, though outstanding performances by both keepers prevented any chances from being converted.
It’s become harder and harder to gauge South comparatively to teams in similar positions on the ladder. We’ve cleaned up our defensive half over the last few weeks, but our issues with goal scoring have resurfaced, and, as that’s a key factor in the outcome of a football game, it’s something we should be somewhat concerned about. South’s main issue on Saturday was summed up by captain Marcus Schroen, who could be heard screaming it to his side on multiple occasions; “we’re too deep”. It was observable from the first minute; Gerrie Sylaidos spent a majority of the first half sitting just above left-back Lambropoulos, which was often prioritised over his midfield duties. Billy Konstantinidis, once again, found himself in the centre-forward position (at his most advanced), but often dropped even further into the midfield. Skapetis acted as our striker, leaving Billy’s main skillset under-utilised. As our full-backs have had less and less presence on the wings in recent weeks, crosses were scarce, with our wingers preferring to turn into the box and take shoot themselves.
Playing so deep had massive implications on our game; simply put, we had to work much harder to bring the ball up, and when Gully countered, there was a whole chunk space they could advance through uncontested. As custom with South, despite sporadic plays, we still managed to create the better chances of the first half. In the 21st minute, Dorron sends a ball three quarters of the way up the pitch, and the Gully defender it lands closest to, who may have had the sun in his eyes, messes up the timing. This leaves Skapetis, who’d run in for the challenge, the opportunity to muscle his way onto the ball, though his attempt is saved by former South keeper Gerrard Tyson. When the ball bounces back to him, he is left with one Gully defender to get passed, and he is unable to do so. Our physicality allowed us more success when distributing long balls, but our most damaging issue, i.e. that we aren’t scoring, still seemed prevalent. Aside from an early opportunity by Giuseppe Marafioti (his only real contribution of the game), and one of the few pressing runs from Ben Djiba, in which he kept the ball for too long, we weren’t really doing much with the ball. And considering how much space we were giving Gully, they definitely had an easier time setting up plays.
The second half, as it usually does, extinguished any momentum we had created in the first 45. We were still playing far too deep for any fluid breakthroughs, and as a result had to hold onto the ball for much longer while our midfield pushed up. Gully were often able to trap us in the defensive midfield area, or at least prevent us from building any further. Until the dying moments of the game, the only notable shots produced by both teams were long shots, albeit ours was far more threatening (and actually on target). After a throw-in is placed at the feet of Konstantinidis, he is able to bring the ball up and volley it just outside the box, which curls into the top corner, requiring an athletic save from Tyson. While it was an impressive display of football, it also marked the desperation of our attacking half - there truly wasn’t another effective option.
Our final effort of the game came in the 80th minute. We had begun pressing the Gully defensive harshly, as our best way to attain possession so far up the field was through a counter attack (as opposed to bringing it up ourselves). Our pressure allowed Krousoratis to pluck the ball from Gully’s defence, and his effort is saved again by Tyson, who had an exceptional game. Two minutes later, our own keeper was asked to pull off a great save also. Jay Davies' free kick was bending into the top corner, and required a monster save from an outstretched Dorron. Our new signing has been given a lot of praise without having made too many important saves, but his save on Saturday secured a point for South, and made his value known to the club. This would be the last significant play of the match, and the game would end scoreless.
Once again, I’m torn on our efforts. The football wasn’t bad, the defending wasn’t bad, and we were able to keep consecutive clean sheets for the first time this season. You can’t help wonder if we’d played a bit further up the pitch, would our attacks have been more effective? It still looks like we don’t know that to do with our strikers, and the constant shifting of our wingers makes me wonder if it’s trying to create complementary link ups, or just allow players to be in their preferred positions for chunks of time. Either way, we weren’t able to get the ideal result, but a single point is still crucial in dispelling the relegation threat. We’ll be continuing our battle with teams in similar positions, with the Knights next week at Lakeside. I’m fairly confident we’ll be able to attain 3 points within the last 6 matches, but beating a large portion of these teams will be essential for those looking for a finals run.
Notable players: Josh Dorron
South Melbourne FC: 0
Green Gully SC: 0
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