@African-Monkey said in A League 2024/25:
Good results for the NZ teams today, both walking away with victories.
Auckland FC 4 points clear!!!
Good to see the Phoenix end their losing run. They do however look like a shadow of the team they were last year unfortunately.
Important win for Auckland to get their season back on track.
@Canes4life said in A League 2024/25:
@African-Monkey said in A League 2024/25:
Good results for the NZ teams today, both walking away with victories.
Auckland FC 4 points clear!!!
Good to see the Phoenix end their losing run. They do however look like a shadow of the team they were last year unfortunately.
Important win for Auckland to get their season back on track.
@Canes4life said in A League 2024/25:
@African-Monkey said in A League 2024/25:
Good results for the NZ teams today, both walking away with victories.
Auckland FC 4 points clear!!!
Good to see the Phoenix end their losing run. They do however look like a shadow of the team they were last year unfortunately.
Important win for Auckland to get their season back on track.
Yeah very young Phienix side running around these days. Guys like Walker, Piper, Hughes, Sheridan , Sutton and 16 year old Luke Brooke-Smith have seen a fair bit of action this season.
Like Central Coast, a bit of a rebuild going on for the Nix.
Auckland FC share the spoils with the Melbourne Victory. Fair result, De Vries had a huge chance saved somehow by Duncan early, while Velupillay nearly snatched it at the end for the Victory. Good crowd of 15,000 especially at this time of the year. Auckland stretch the lead at the top to 5 points with Adelaide still to play.
Nix play Melbourne City on Friday.
14 days later
A gutsy effort by the Phoenix to get a scoreless draw against Sydney. A good debut from Alby Kelly-Heald in goal. So many young kids playing at the end. I'm not sure where the goals are going to come from though.
7 days later
Auckland FC with a dramatic late equalizer in last night's top of the table clash with Adelaide. Great heart shown by them after the ref decided to chuck on an Adelaide shirt and award a goal that should never have stood. A classic case of we will not let a Kiwi side go top of the league if ever you'll see. He should be sacked for good after that. It wasn't incompetence, it was straight out corruption in the 2nd half, you'd think we were the Wahs with some of the calls we were getting. Still, great point against the odds.
@African-Monkey Yeah when the local commentator takes one look and says "Oh - that'll be disallowed" and then the goal still stands you know somethign isn't quite right.
Shocking miss form the defender on the cross though, but glad they snaffled a point at the end. Compelling stuff!!
Keeping an eye on the transfer window, Bournemouth could be loaning out Mark Travers. If this happens a couple of other moves may quickly happen, like Neto may come back from Arsenal (unlikely) or potentially Paulsen gets called in as back up to Kepa. I have been enjoying watching Paulsen play for AKL FC so lets see what happens
3 months later
Well there we have it, Auckland FC win the Premiers Plate in their first season with 2 games to go.
I think they belong now.
@African-Monkey said in A League 2024/25:
Well there we have it, Auckland FC win the Premiers Plate in their first season with 2 games to go.
I think they belong now.
Very impressive. Meanwhile, Phoenix fans wait for another season
@Machpants said in A League 2024/25:
So no play off/finals? They've won?
There are playoffs. Auckland have come 1st in the regular season, so they therefore win the Premiers plate, which is also known as the A League Premiership.
Whoever wins the playoffs are awarded the A League Championship.
3 months later
Last year's third placegetters likely non starters this season
6 months later
Is this really the first post of the current A-league season?
The Phoenix got pumped 5-0 by Auckland FC yesterday and coach Giancarlo Italiano promptly resigned. They have not been good for some time, I don't pay enough attention to know if the problem is either because of lack of spending, poor acquisitions, or poor coaching and tactics (or a combination of these things). They appear to be a mess right now
Yeah, I did briefly look for a thread last night after that horrendous own goal.
For all the grief the Warriors get as a sporting franchise, after 20-odd years the Phoenix have been extremely ordinary in an Australian comp too.
@Donsteppa is one playoff run (or two?) all they have to show. Auckland FC have been far more successful in a short time
I would talk more about it, but I'd be talking to myself about this league so I don't bother lol.
@African-Monkey said in A League 2024/25:
I would talk more about it, but I'd be talking to myself about this league so I don't bother lol.
No posts since August 2025 says it all I guess. There's no one here who is significantly interested and willing to drive the conversation
@canefan said in A League 2024/25:
@African-Monkey said in A League 2024/25:
I would talk more about it, but I'd be talking to myself about this league so I don't bother lol.
No posts since August 2025 says it all I guess. There's no one here who is significantly interested and willing to drive the conversation
Yeah, I follow it a fair bit, have a season ticket to Perth Glory games and watch all Auckland games, and catch whatever Nix games that i can, so I do follow it a fair bit but yeah, it's not the most popular of leagues, the crowds across the league are down, the Nix have some of the worst crowds in the comp, so interest in the comp in general is low, especially as it's shown on an app here in Aus.
@canefan They do have a billionaire owner and a very relaxed salary cap for the first couple of years. The Phoenix’s problem is that the owners treat it like the Brighton model develop them young then once they hit the big time sell them off for profit. That money doesn’t go back into the squad hence why we’re full of journeyman.
@African-Monkey There’s still the diehard regulars, but the reason the crowds are down are because we keep losing an playing boring football I wouldn’t mind if we played a more exciting game, not the slow build up at the back. With Chiefy gone will be interesting to see who comes in.
