Football Season Guide

Finished tenth last season after yet another disappointing campaign. Their squad promised a lot but the injury to Lawrence, Taggart's lack of confidence, and numerous other factors turned it into a disastrous campaign, really. It's hard to be more positive about the campaign ahead either, despite veteran creator Tom Lawrence finally returning from injury. They lost influential CB Scott Wootton too, who bizarrely retired just a month or so before the start of the campaign - he'd had months prior in which to do so. They've lost a lot of experience pre-season, not just in Wootton. Birighitti, Pennington, Risdon, Wales, and of course, star striker Taggart. Some played bigger roles than others but all of them were good for the younger players around them. They've brought in some good players pre-season but not many of them arrive with the experience of the personnel they've lost. Nieuwenhof in midfield should bring it, as should Jackson at the back, but the rest aren't really cut from that particular cloth. Aside from the afore-mentioned duo, the only proven quality player they've brought in is Henry Hore, who will help them out creatively. It's a concern though - they've really not changed this squad much, particularly in the final third, at least not progressively. They're going to need massive campaigns from Kucharski, Hore, Despotovski, and Lawrence if they're to score goals this season, and in truth it's hard to estimate which one of them is supposed to lead the line. It's most likely going to be Kucharski but every single one of those players is far better in a supporting capacity so there are balance concerns in attack. Their midfield should be fine, and assuming Jackson settles in well, their defence should be ok too. There's a general lack of quality in this squad though. Most players in it are just ok, for the most part. A lot of their new recruits only came from the NPL too. As always, the home advantage they have is big because it takes at least 4 hours to get to Perth for any other A-League club - longer if the teams are from New Zealand. Other than that though, there's a very real chance of this Glory experiment not working. The names are there for them to be an ok team, but the balance is questionable to say the least.