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Never a fan of PK myself (as this forum would show) but I believe that the reason for Melbourne City success was Erik Mombaerts (whom I believe is also at Troyes). Erik created the core of the squad and built a team spirit. Unfortunately Erik had to return to France and so his assistant PK took over. With Buckingham by his side and still being mentored by Erik, the club has found success. By the sound of things PK has lost the players and his limitations are being rudely exposed.

2. O'Neill, 1. Bos. Would've been 1 for Talbot if it wasn't for the pen.

I tell you what. One look on that Troyes forum and looking on the Troyes social pages PK isn't very well liked one bit!

You don't like this then jw? 😉 Like you, I think WU worked in Geelong and was building a following. However noting that Geelong is a city with a population in the 300,000s, so doesn't pass the Gallop test. But to me definitely works as a location for an A League team. Canberra doesn't pass the Gallop test either but seems to be universally agreed as a good location. I'd suggest Wollongong as another similar candidate.

Western should move to Geelong. Even since Heart 's foundation, failures have been North Queensland (Townsville) and Gold Coast. Putting expansion clubs in growth corridors is dubious as both Western and Macarthur are demonstrating. I've said many times that Tasmania is a dead duck as far as I am concerned, and I base that on my 14+ years residing in Hobart. Even the Tasmanian State League (Aussie rules) struggles. Tasmania is NOT one united place, and there is a north-south divide, and even the AFL has dillydallied for years over plonking a team there. With all due respect to football, IMO the AFL knows a thing or two about what makes its brand work, and why we think we might know better is beyond me. David Gallop said years ago that expansion needed to be into existing population centres of 1m or more, and IMO he was right about that. Superficially Auckland looks sensible, except that New Zealand is a member of the Oceania Football Confederation, and club teams from NZ cannot participate in Asian Football Confederation competitions. IMO that issue needs to be resolved before drawing any more NZ clubs into the A-League. And bear in mind that Rugby Union is far and away the premier football code in NZ. I cannot understand why we, in football, cannot learn from our mistakes. Only months after selling the Grand Final to Sydney for a paltry $330,000 per club per year over three years, apparently because APL was in financial distress of some degree, we are coming out with yet another expansion proposal when the previous one has not delivered any return so far. Further, I cannot see how this proposed expansion can fit in with the mooted National Second Division.

The above posters' views on PK seem to be a bit more favourable than my own. In my view PK is a tactically inept hack whose main coaching "quality" is being a hardass and berating players for being 3cm out of position. His tactical ineptness is most obvious when one of his teams is being absolutely outplayed. In such situations he appears unable to notice the tactical issue (blaming individual errors and lack of work rate) which results in him not making substitutes, or making like-for-like substitutes (such that you are relying on a moment of individual brilliance to get something from the game) or making subs so late thst the player has no time to make an impact. A prime example of this is the GF against WU were it was obvious that things were not working and certain subs needed to be made. But he dragged his feet in making any unforced subs, eben though it was obvious Tillio needed to come on. He also seems to detest young talented players.

Yeah that's a very good point! We create so many and yet don't capitalise on them! Just look at the game we played away against the Wanderers! Another great point! Finals are almost worthless in a way now apart from getting the toilet seat and being crowned as "Champions" This game would grow so much if they went down the path of getting rid of finals and bringing in promotion and relegation!