Last time we went to Avondale we walked away with the Premier’s Plate, today no such reward was on the cards. We were hoping for a draw, and importantly a goal. We got neither.

We got to the game and grabbed a pizza from the food cart. Avondale have again incrementally improved their facility with merch, food and decoration. Notable additions included a painted logo on the pavement and flags around the ground. They even added a gym in a portable shed behind the goals. Their ground is still largely just that though, portable, and their rent-a-grandstand is still only allowed to seat people in the bottom rows. Not that the grand stand was full though, of the few hundred people at the game, more than half were South fans.

On the pitch things started ok for South. Once again we saw a possession based style with the ball moving down the wings. We peppering the goal with crosses and launching the occasional long shot. Brennan was good, but is missing a burst of pace to beat defenders, and Mells put in good balls, but far too often we didn’t have anyone get to the end of them. We did however push a few saves out of the Avondale keeper – despite our lack of a necessary striker. Harding is not cut out to lead the charge.

20 minutes in though the inevitable happened. Avondale tore us apart from defence to attack, comfortably knocking though the middle, down the wing and into the box. An untouchable play for the first goal. From here our best hope was a draw, and Avondale were content to make things hard for us and sit back while our toothless strike force only slightly troubled the keeper.

It’s all well and good to have possession, it’s even comfortable to watch – but despite play after play in the box (which is an improvement on early in the season for sure) it was never enough to really get our hearts racing. From Avondale’s side too, they could have had more. Their counters were quick to break our defence and thanks to Lopez we were lucky to maintain a 1-0 deficit at the break.

Coming into half time though the game was still on and we were curious about what the team would put out in the second half. We don’t have a good record in second halves, and with limited attacking options on the bench we had no idea what the response would be. Well, it turned out to be a little reckless.

We played a higher line and started the half well, but at the 55th minutethe collapse occurred – our worst of the season. In 5 minutes – yes 5 minutes, I had to double check this – we copped three goals. All from turnovers in the midfield (including one from kick off) and all through an unorganised defence that gave Avondale strikers too much space.

What else is there to say? We had a few more chances, hit the post, but the last half hour of the game was junk time. Avondale sat back and waited the clock out while we failed to prove that we could score against a team with nothing left to play for.

When’s Bonada back? Will we get a new coach? We are currently in 12th spot and with Oakleigh next week… following a cup game against Bentleigh… we may reach the half way point of the season bottom of the table.

After the game there were a lot of takes. I for one thought the performance (especially in the first half) wasn’t too bad, but a few scathing posts on twitter afterwards were far more negative. How to I feel? I don’t want to feel right now – I just don’t want to get relegated.

Finally

Shout-out to the Avondale fans who came to agitate us behind our goals only to be shut down by an elderly fan. Great stuff guys. It might have meant more if you cared about your club by maybe… watching the game and supporting ‘your’ team?