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I can confirm the club has signed Holger Badstuber

Interesting how we all have different expectations and insights, hopes and fears. Some believe Gombau might have revolutionised the club in a 2nd/3rd season. We'll never know. He did a lot for Adelaide but there seemed to be a limit to his ability even there- won FFA Cup and looked pretty on the field but never got into top 2. Amor changed a lot of Gombau's work or developed it - not sure. They should not have won the premiership in S4 but everyone else (especially WSW) lost the plot and they fell over the line. There is no doubt that Gombau lost the plot with WSW on several occasions, and if the stories are true in the dressing room, on the training track and with the club's heavies as well. The 2nd derby was an absolute disgrace in terms of tactics, positional play and everything else. As I've said before the team looked totally confused most of the season. Either his communication was not clear, unrealistic or non-existent. We are not, and shouldn't be 'a project'. We are a successful club that wants/needs to go higher than we have done locally and rise again continentally. I am impressed with Babbel's appointment but he still has to prove himself. If he manages to gain the respect of players, club and most of all, the supporters by being a strong leader/manager who has flexibility, tactical nous, gets WSW culture and we actually are competitive on the park, I will be happy. Spotless/ANZ are awful venues but last year most of our games were worse to watch (we played okay in a few but most awful). Of course it isn't all to do with Gombau, the players had their part. It was the whole package and my hope in appointing Gombau was that he would steady the ship and move them forward as he indicated he would, having learned much from Postecoglou - he didn't and everything behind the scenes went toxic. I actually like Roly and think there is a lot more to see. I've heard elsewhere that Gombau had a personal dislike of Roly and nothing he did or could do would satisfy Gombau - hard to play well under such conditions. Hard to know what role you have if the coach won't talk to you. Hard to comprehend that in a coach - but it seems to happen often! We wait in hope for a good season of good, exciting, effective, and winning football (not every game but more than draws and losses) - that I will be happy with!

Just cancelled my business insurance with NRMA.....they asked why and I told them that they had stopped sponsoring my football club (amongst other things, such as being twice as expensive as an equivalent insurer...). The woman said "Oh are you a Collingwood supporter?" So I gave her a quick education in all things A-League

Stood firm when that pathetic little lying dog accused him of racism too.

He will always be a legend at WSW. I have such happy memories of his goal to beat the smurfs and stop the "invincibles" in a game that was one of our grittiest performances in a derby in a poor season and unfortunately was overshadowed by Arnie and tifogate, and his goal in the 5-4 semi win against the Roar just to name a couple. Always put in and bled red and black. Will be missed by the fans. I would of rather seen him retire than to have him play against us. Age is not on his side unfortunately.

Or China, AFL is massive there

Will be nice to see Foxe get the Perth job when Popa leaves for a job in Latvia in a few months.

Prydz, I am surprised that you are still surprised. Gombau said one thing in October during the interview process, and that's where Lederer's endorsement came from. He was signed in good faith. Then Gombau did the total opposite once he took charge in November, and it became blatantly obvious after the ANZ derby rout that there was a mismatch. The alarm bells were ringing. Gombau was told that the WSW are not a vehicle for some project, but a result oriented football club. That was the framework he was supposed to operate in - and Gombau chose to ignore his employers. "I won't change", he said more than once, and the club ending up in the 7th heaven after Rd 27 he considered being "part of the project". The thing is: there was no such project. It only existed in his imagination. Gombau was toast long before the season finished, and the rest is history. Enter Babbel. I can't stress enough just how well Chairman, CEO and GM did to lure Babbel to Australia. We've been discussing Andre Schubert here. Mack at the time suggested that he might be "too big of a manager to come to Australia", but Babbel is bigger. There are not many German managers I rate higher than Babbel: Loew, Heynckes, Tuchel, Klopp, Wagner, Rangnick, Hecking, Streich, Roger Schmidt, Nagelsmann. Babbel is in the next group, and Kurz isn't. We signed a German top 20 manager. It really is unbelievable. We will all experience that the gap between a Catalan bus driver and a Babbel is as big as Valles Marinieris.

It's the NRL. They don't care about home grounds or supporting local communities. They just want to go where they think they might make more money.

Or a grandstand......... .. The Standalab

And it's already off to a good start...

Really? Firstly I thought it was pretty clear that it was a joke, not an attempt to lay the groundwork for future criticisms of the club. Secondly you don’t think it’s reasonable to make a joke about the club who failed to get membership packs to members in multiple seasons? Or who botched the seat allocations on the move to Spotless (I got moved from behind the home bench at Parra to behind the corner flag next to the away bay, some people had their groups split, parents in different bays to kids etc)? Or who sent out an inflammatory email right before what should have been positive exposure at the Arsenal game? Etc etc. I said in the coach thread that the hiring of Babel feels like the end of amateur hour so i’m hopeful things are moving in the right direction. I think you may be reading way too much into an off hand comment.

This is worse than a broken heart.

Added bonus - he already hates Carney....

Downloaded the pictures in case that tweet goes away or twitter dies or whatever. I think they are bigger than the automatic resizing so you might be able to click on them and see them full size.

Completely different worlds. The parrot and his challenged mate are simply perpetuating a half baked narrative invented by corporates from insecure rival codes. A prophecy was cooked up that, inspite of glaring differences between Australia and these countries, crowd violence would escalate from what Australian sport is used to, to the horrors seen during world news segments. What they gloss over is the fact these countries have seen their governments collapse into absolute disarray, with social order no longer present. In fact, North African countries have seen "ultras" and "active support" rise up through the chaos to become some of the few cohesive and functioning, though still quite violent, forms of govermment in the region. Australia lacks the basic elements for such manic scenes to manifest themselves due to a simple football match. In fact, the last time such scenes were witnessed here, was when these custodians of decent society, incited a race riot across the south of Sydney. A scuffle, not unlike those seen at A League matches, had long since ended with the antagonisers being pursued by authorities. When out of this relative quiet comes these boofheads and their ilk demanding retaliation. Compare those days of terror to the glasses and smoke bombs being tossed around for 20 min in Melbourne that day.

They way our club is run I'm surprised Nick Ward isn't still there.

"Rugby Australia events supported by the NSW Government have attracted 147,000 overnight visitors and generated $102 million in overnight expenditure for the NSW visitor economy over the past five years," Ayres said. Is that supposed to sound impressive? 147,000 visitors and $102 million over five years? So that's 30,000 visitors and $20 million per year in 'overnight expenditure' (whatever that is) If 30,000 visitors generate only $20 million, why aren't we pushing for bigger events? I'm pretty sure there are other sports out there that can get us more than 30,000 visitors a year. I dunno... maybe a sport like football?

We need Markus Babbel's ruthless German efficiency to sort out the forum first.

now hug...

Seriously dude no wants to hear about murder on here keep that **** off the forum I don’t know why you posted that may your Aunty RIP and leave it at that

i've heard that the RBB will be boycotting

That could be anyone other than Carney’s Mum actually on second thoughts that could be anyone

Looks like someone is getting cut up and thrown into Eastern Creek