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If the team continues like this, and heaven forbid, even makes the finals and competes, then the old saying 'if it aint broke, dont fix it' comes to mind. I dont want to become Sydney FC and it sure as hell wont feel as good if se basically buy our forst title, City fans can enjoy it as much as they want, they'd never have won it without their sugar daddys I'm not sure if Heart is using the full salary cap this season. Next season the salary cap is $2.55m, and unless Heart storm into the finals and pretty much go on to win the grand final, I don't think many Heart players will have the leverage to be able to re-sign for more money. Indeed, I actually think most will re-sign for less. And I reckon Heart will have a fair number of young players and minimum wage players (e.g., Hoffman, Velaphi). So if Engelaar is on 400k, I reckon we could possibly re-sign him for the same amount, or maybe a bit less, inside the cap, if there's smart accounting (which I expect under Man City). But I agree that Engelaar is a real international marquee, and IMO if he keeps up his current form he could well be worth the international marquee spot for next season, because one bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Why gamble on a new international marquee when you already have one that truly does the job? However, as I said, I think with a bit of smarts Heart can get the best of both worlds and sign Engelaar just inside the cap. Murphy, if Heart re-signs Engelaar under the cap, what position do you think merits an international marquee spot?

I think that Heart are a good chance for the top six. As I write the top 3 sides are Roar, WSW and AU. Sydney play these three over the next three weeks, then they play MV and WP who are also competing for a spot on the six. Their last match is PG. So I can't see them picking up to many points. CCM play BNR and WSW from the top three. MBH and MV are in the play for a top six spot but lucky for them they play NUJ and PTH which I would expect them to win. So they have a chance. The Phoenix play only AU from the top 3. MBH, MV, SFC are in the play for the top six. And they also have NUJ and PG. Due to the amount of injuries they have sustained, I think they will shape the final six but won't make it. MV only play BNR from the tope three and as a gift they have NUJ and PG. The fellow contenders are SFC, WP and CCM. Counting against them is the travel and Muscat. Just chckedthe scores on the FFA website and NUJ are leading WSW 2 - 0. hmm maybe the jets aren't easy points after all. The race just got tougher but I still believe that Heart will play finals.

So Aziz returns to Turkey at season's end and yesterday's performance by BG was pretty good (may well have been Thomson's final nail on his coffin), I would be very happy if the club kept him. With the right coaching and tuition he can only grow.

My recollection was that OE was on $400k for a one year contract. Of course if he stays depends on a lot of factors including whether he wants another season here in Oz.

On the proposition that Ben replaces Aziz, when does Aziz's loan deal finish?

That is my understanding that if the ref has seen it and deems no incident then that stands. The AFL MRP tend to treat things the same way but the MRP does have the power to sanction a player even if the ump has decided that there was nothing in it. This additional power is used sparingly. What I don't know what the guidelines are for the MRP as set by the FFA/FIFA.

I agree that 5 yellows = suspension. BUT I would certainly like that the A-League introduce a match review panel for every game like they do in the AFL. The MRP would look for simulation, behind play fouling and other dangerous incidents that the ref may have missed. This isb't a slight on the referees as they need to keep looking at where the ball is and of course if they have successfully simulated then they have fooled the ref. Penalties can range from awarding yellow cards all the way through to red cards.

I don't agree, his broken leg saved him from the effects of the Aloisi football devolution. If he'd played we would have seen his skills quickly devolve just like all the other players. I'm not surprised that he had so much room though, Roar players were frightened of him and often backed off him. It'll take a while before HAL players work him out and devise a successful strategy to contain him, in the meanwhile long may he reign At the match I felt that in the first fifteen minutes there was one player trying to mark him but due to his size and strength he toyed with them. Then towards the end of the first half two players tried to mark him to no avail. In the second half there always seemed to be three players around him when the ball came near him EXCEPT that one time when he snuck up the middle and received the cross from Mate to kick the goal. How does a bloke his size sneak unnnoticed is an indictement on the Roar defence.

Well for me JVS has been changing tactics from week to week and during the game itself. This is confounding the lesser coaches because they don't know what to expect and can't make changes on the fly. Up till yesterday I thought that Mulvey was doing quite well as coach but JVS showed that he can't change the game plan during the match.

I can't remember the last time we had a clean sheet for two weeks in a row...

With regards to the crowds that is the result of playing crap football for 12 rounds. Lost a lot people and it will take a lot of wins to get them back.

To be realistically (although I am still optimistic) by round 12 we could exert no influence on the ladder other than provide 3 points and GF tally for other teams. Now the Heart cannot be taken by granted and we can influence the ladder. I am very optimistic that we won't finish 10th (PG and Jett will fight for that honour) and we'll definitely play for 6th.

How can you say that there is a moratorium on re-signings when recently Hoffman and Velaphi were given new contracts? Furthermore there is the rumoured contract with Mooy who would be a new signing - AFAIK no one has denied the existence of this contract. Personally I would rather the club have signed Williams ahead of Hoffman but I presume that next season will show the folly of re-signing Hoffman.

I don't think that the loss of one visa spot will make a huge difference. Right now for me, the quality of the coach matters more than the quality of the visa players - case in point is SFC contrast that with BR or WP. SFC have high profile high quality visa players but a crap coach, the latter two have relative unknowns but better coaching and look at the difference. Coaching matters more followed by good scouting. next year's litmus test will be Berisha at MV under Muscat. A bigger change will be the compulsory Asian visa player - on this I was undecided but now I think that it limits the clubs for unknown returns.

In defence of SBS's analysis of the week it's meant to be of the game transmitted live on Friday nights on SBS. However on at least one other occasion they have obtained footage from Foxtel and done analysis of another game. But by and large it is meant to be about the Friday night game. Having said that I like listening to Fozzie because it gives me an opportunity to puncture holes in whatever he says. And yes SBS is way too Sydney centric.

The way socceroos forwards are going down he may well be in contention but just having said that we just cursed the guy.

It takes no balls at all to dismiss a CF who has scored one in about 15 starts and missed about a dozen clear cut chances. Especially if your predecessor brought him to the club, so there is no accountability for benching him. I'm not comparing JA to JVS. I'm judging JVS's overall performance at this club, having regard to the players available to him and their individual match day performances. Not to mention the motivation of having a billionaire Arab owner. I am not sure how much of a motivator having a billionaire owner is. It does guarantee the clubs existence but their salary was already guaranteed by the FFA. For the younger players it may mean another path to the EPL or perhaps some other leagues. For middle age players (~25) if they haven't come under the radar of other leagues it is unlikely to happen because of the ownership changes. For the older players it may mean the end of their professional career a bit earlier than expected so they may have a bigger motivator. The only real motivation that I can think of is that the club will eventually have better facilities. So although I agree that there is some motivation I don't believe it to be that big.

Just remembering that when Man City bought the club it seemed that everyone was stating that the club needed a big clean out and there would be a major culling at season's end. Yet the way that the team is improving and playing right now I would have no way of knowing who should be given their marching orders other than Mifsud. For me Hoffman and Kalmar should have been released but it has been reported that Hoff has been given a new contract - I have to admit that he hasn't made me tear my hair out in the last six weeks so maybe he is deserving of a new contract. For others David Williams is deserving of derision but right now he has scored every time he has been on the field for the last three weeks, if he keeps that up till season's end he may end up winning the golden boot. And we should not forget that the turn around began before it was announced that Man City had bought the club. JVS has performed admirably in the circumstances.

If JVS keeps delivering he must have the inside running. What an unbelievable turn around!

Absolutely. If I was on the panel what i would be looking for would be: experience as a senior coach, preferably with limited resources (in a salary cap comp you can't just buy a new player if the bloke you got first up isn't working out) a proven record of playing our (and Man City's) style of possession football a hunger for success relevant licences I would pay scant regard to playing history. The A League has 10 teams with very similar squads in terms of quality. The league winners are generally the managers who can assemble a squad with a slight edge and (more importantly I think) have those players perform at their peak. All the managers in opposing teams tend to be experienced at working in this environment and that makes them difficult opponents. Given Gombau's success I suspect we may seem more managers like him and thus the league may be even tougher come next year, so we'd better get the appointment right (this time). Food for thought: How do you prove "hunger for success"? How do you prove a proven track record of playing possession football? I would also be looking at: the ability to analyse and explain a team's performance. if they have youth team coaching experience - indicates an ability to teach. The ability to prepare different game plans to better match an opposition Real time analisys of a match in progress - this should weed out the Farinas that are able to analyse a game afterwards but have nothing on the day.

When I started following football the first thing I noticed was that the manager was far more influential on game day than his AFL counterpart. The second thing that came across was that football was more like a chess game than the AFL - it also explained why AFL coaches took up watching football to borrow tactics. So I agree with you the most important appointment is the manager and all else will follow. Another example was last season with WSW appointing Popovic who then turned Beauchamp and Topor Stanley into decent players. Well they are probably still crap but he made them work as a solid unit. And this season is Gambau that took a dysfunctional club with some ordinary talent and turned them into footballers.

Just for the record dental malpractice are treated similarly to the drugs in sport. If a dentist is accused of malpractice there is an investigation, a report is submitted to the Dental Board which then has the power to issue warnings, fines and even the withdrawal of a practicing license. A 'simple' investigation usually takes six months before a report is submitted. The report can be about 2,000 pages where each sentence has been vetted by a lawyer. The Dental Board members have to read this report and then deliberate. So for a 'simple' dental malpractice charge can take about 9 months for a final deliberation. ASADA has had to deal with two clubs and maybe about 80 people involved - quite a few with heavy duty lawyers so I am not expecting any formal resolution before the end of December.

Jarred Gillett is refereeing - this is the external random factor that will render all forecasts meaningless, all planning by the coaches and training by players to be pointless. Worst referee in the A-League IMHO. Who will win? It is impossible to determine because Gillett is on the pitch.

It'll definitely be harder to find someone in their 20's but don't forget we practically have unlimited money at our disposal. We can afford to pay wages that are competitive with what's on offer with Europe, not to mention that City owns our club and that means that scouts from other clubs will likely have an eye on our talent too. That being said, I still think our marquee will be closer to 30 than 25 but I don't think we'll be chasing someone who's in their mid to late thirties. The "unlimited money at our disposal" seems to be a constant meme in the forum. I would be weary of having too high an expectation on the amount of money that MCFC will provide. First there will be capital investment on infrastructure then there will be capital investment on staff (principally coaches) and there will be capital investment on players. The owners are not likely to over invest - they will invest enough to ensure that the club gets to the top of the A-League and be competitive in the ACL. Given that the most effective marquee on the pitch has been Broich followed by Ono. ADP has not been as successful on the pitch because he has the dead weight of Farina but he has also been able to pull in crowds at functions and matches. So if MCFC are going to bring a name marquee that can raise the profile and businessmen in Melbourne and Sydney will be willing to pay $1000 for a chat like ADP, then we are likely to get an Italian or Brazilian someone people will instantly recognise - but this will cost money. The alternative is to bring someone who is relatively unknown but better than the local players a la Broich and is unlikely to cost huge amounts of money (depending on the rest of the season Engelaar may fit the bill). In any case to re-iterate the point - MCFC will spend only what is required to make the club successful and not a cent more. So be weary with having too high expectations on the amount of cash available to the club.

For me WP have players that can do something creative with very little room to move eg Hernandez, Steymsugens. Can Hoffman cope with these types of players? This will be a big test for the back four to be able to shut them down effectively. And lets not forget that they can also score from a distance. Their defence has stopped leaking as well. Heart will have Engelaar back and hopefully we'll see 90 minutes of him in the mid-field. But the most exciting prospect for me will be the tactical battle between JVS and Merrick. The Heart have got some justifiable confidence so for me this game will be a marker of how far the team has progressed and how far they have to go.