Nix’s inflexibility an issue
Ernie Merrick foresaw Saturday night’s performance from the Wellington Phoenix.
The Newcastle Jets coach watched his side lose 2-1 to the Phoenix in round one and was impressed by the fight shown by his former side, but also saw an issue with the Phoenix’s 5-2-3 setup.
‘‘I think when you play that defensive structure, if it’s a draw or you’re up 1-0, it really works. The problem is, when you play like that when you’re down a goal, it makes life very difficult. You’ve got to change your whole mindset and play much more attacking football and commit forward.’’
That was the problem for the Phoenix in their 3-0 loss to the Western Sydney Wanderers at Westpac Stadium on Saturday.
They were down a goal inside 11 minutes when Alexander Baumjohann opened the scoring for the Wanderers.
From there, the Wanderers controlled the match, committing numbers forward when it was warranted but not overcommitting, which prevented the Phoenix from hitting them on the counter, neutralising a key component of their gameplan.
It also highlighted the inflexibility Phoenix coach Mark Rudan has in his squad.
He has a plenty of attacking midfielders and quick wide players but has just three defensive midfielders across his 21-man squad.
One of those, Poland’s Michal Kopczynski, can’t even get a run in the match day squad, meaning the burden to play 90 minutes
falls to Mandi and Alex Rufer, with the former’s struggles for match fitness showing up badly in the final 20 minute against the Wanderers.
Perhaps, of more concern remains the lack of a No 9, outand-out striker.
The only one at the club is an 18-year-old English academy prospect scoring screamers in the reserve team but he is destined to leave the club in January to attend Wake Forest University in the United States.
It means when Rudan turns to his bench, he sees much of the same as to what he already has on the field.
‘‘I’d love depth everywhere,’’ Rudan said of his squad. ‘‘This is the team that I’ve got and I’ll back them to continue to improve.’’
All of this isn’t to say the Phoenix can’t be competitive this season, but if Merrick was seeing holes in the gameplan from week one, then you would expect all the other coaches in the league to find them as well.
That was the case on Saturday, with Wanderers assistant coach Jean-Paul de Marigny pleased with how his side exploited the Phoenix’s weaknesses.
‘‘We worked tactically all week, we analysed them and identified their strengths and threats, and we also definitely identified their weakness in their system, so the most satisfying thing is that we executed that very, very well.’’
Rudan said he expected his side to be able to bounce back against Melbourne City on Friday night.
‘‘It’s a one-off performance, a one-off game, as far as I’m concerned,’’ he said.