Jacob Spoonley: Sky Sport football analyst on Auckland FC's 0-2 loss to Melbourne Victory

Auckland FC's dream debut season in football's A-League has come up one game short of the Grand Final.

Their 2-nil semi-final second leg loss to Melbourne Victory in Auckland - on the back of a controversial refereeing call - has consigned them to a 2-1 defeat on aggregate.

Sky Sport football analyst Jacob Spoonley says this outcome would have been 'devastating' for Auckland fans. 

"The big moments are what you want to get right - and these sort of situations...the implication of a lot of the rules is that you want to allow play to develop to ensure that if a goal's going to be scored, that you let it hit the back of the neck."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudgin
from News Talks EDB Well, that.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Was a tough one last night, wasn't it.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
No hand crushed my party. Auckland FC's remarkable, record breaking first.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Season will not hand a grand finale.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Melbourne victory beating Auckland to sc Tundel to take a
two one aggregate win and a place in the A
League Grand Final. Apparently there were kids crying all over
the place. Sky Football analyst and former All Whites Jacob
Spoonley called the game alongside Pioneer last night and he's
with me now.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Good morning Jacob, Good morning Francesca.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
Oh was that a hard one to take? What did
you make of their performance last night?

Speaker 3 (00:51):
Oh? It was an thrawling tie. So two legs, the
first league in Melbourne and then the return devastation I
think for many Aucklanders last night, Frank JESCA. But a
lot changed over the course of the two games, huge moments,
and then if we look at the second leg, just
an isolation after Bill has changed the way that he

(01:12):
set up Melbourne victory and that really took away I
think the strength of the Auckland defensive effort. They proactive
defensive effort. They like to press and he basically said
to the midfield, I'm going to overload you and you
have to make a decision. It's the way you want
to go, and they then had the space that they

(01:34):
were seeking. It was the first time that I think
over the four games they played the season that Auckland
looked uncomfortable defensively. Then they unfortunately weren't able to land
a blow. The luck that you talk about in ties
like this wasn't there. It was with Melbourne victory. Every
time there was a half chance, the ball squirmed to
a white shirt. And then we'll say this quietly Francesca,

(01:54):
but I don't say conclusively that that ball went out.
So that was a big call for the Lion's win
to make.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
Yes, there's been some reenactments done in our office this morning.
People are at the ludhe you with the aficiating, What
did you make of the call?

Speaker 3 (02:12):
I think Alex King, who was the match official in
the mission in the middle, did well enough to let
the game develop. This is a semi final. This is
a match which is involving two physical things, massive capacity,
big engines and they wanted to get into a football match,
so there were no backward steps taken and there were

(02:34):
no apologies made. Did feel at times that there was
inconsistency with what was given as a yellow card or
a foul, but that really is probably a bit of
a foot The big moments are what you want to
get right and in these sort of situations, and kind
of the implication a lot of the rules is that

(02:55):
you want to allow play to develop to ensure that
if a goal is going to be scored, that you
less it hit the back of the neck, and then
you come back and review and try and find something
to say that it wasn't a goal. What we saw
last night was a very quick call from the assistant
referee to say that the ball was out. On the replays,
we saw Giermo Mai doing a wonderful job stretching and

(03:18):
straining to get his foot around the ball, and then
it was really unclear when he touched the book on
the line if it then went out in the air
and came back in to find Logan Rogerson at the
back post.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
Just got in love with it. Though, don't we back,
We don't even start sort of, you know, we can
critique last night's game, But then you sort of think
back to Nata's goal that hit the posts and bounced
out in Melbourne. You know, in hindsight that was really
costly as well.

Speaker 3 (03:44):
Good a footballs in knew, Francescular, that's exactly where we
wanted to go. Yeah, at two nil and Orkland's coming
back from Victoria with a lead of two nil Madame
Moreno in stoppage time would have been the fourth goal
that Auckland scored the ninety sixth minute this season, Francesca.
But that I think gave victory not only a bit

(04:07):
of a chance, it gave them hope as well. You
talk about football goals in these situations, and that's a
moment where I don't think Auckland thinks that victory can
come back into the match, but definitely gives victory belief.
They dodged a bullet there. And now do they have
the freedom, do they have the moment? Are they in
bold and to chase the game? And they were. They
basically won the tie in five minutes sixty to sixty

(04:29):
five minutes. They scored two goals. They relied on their
superstars in Machash and Bruno Fernaoli thirty nine years old.
I'll add as well Francesca and those are the only
two shots that Victory got on target over the one
hundred and eighty minutes, only two goals that they scored
against Auckland across four matches this season.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
All it takes, Jacob. You can't take away, though, what
the team has achieved this season. Coming into this season,
I mean, I don't know. I don't know what you expected,
but I didn't expect that they do what they've done.

Speaker 3 (05:04):
Universally, Conclusively, you can say that they have exceeded expectations.
I don't think Auckland was aware or they didn't understand
what this team could do. From a footballing perspective, we've
been developing local talent for a while now, around about
the last five to ten years. We've been creating players
that overseas markets have been interested in. Francis de Freese

(05:27):
is a name that you wouldn't have heard, or you
wouldn't been able to point them out on a lineup
had you put them in front of many Aucklanders this season.
But he's played in top tier competitions in Europe. He
had to come back and play in our nationally how
amateur competition and had to wait for an opportunity, went
down to the Phoenix last year, was told no, came
back up to Auckland this year and has grabbed the

(05:48):
charts with both hands. And that's all because we've got
representation in our largest city and our biggest sports market.
So these players, these footballers have been waiting for their
chance and then when it came, they took it and
they were very hungry to repay Auckland.

Speaker 2 (06:04):
So do you think it came down to location? Population?
There were over twenty nine thousand people there last night,
the average crowd attendance of over eighteen thousand for the season,
had twenty two thousand replica shirts sold. I mean, you know,
it's not bad for you for a season.

Speaker 3 (06:20):
It's wonderful And a lot of credit has to go
to Mike Higgins, Raft Turnbull and of course Nick Becker.
They put in place the architecture for the engagement. Now
the commercials sit as a byproduct of that, but the
engagement is the most important thing. And I think they've
sent a bit of a blueprint out and they have
corrected I think approach in a number of other codes,

(06:42):
which is we are the ticket you guys come to us? Instead,
they said, where's our community? How can we go meet them?
So for six months they were out at local sports clubs.
They were heading to places where footballer is play football,
so it's even registered football. And they made a real
effort to say we're here to represent you. We're not

(07:04):
going to basically rely on our monopoly in the region
for you to come to us. If you're on professional football,
that's fantastic. Another point Francesca, and I'm apologized, but I'm
going to put my dad's hat on here. Demographic force, Fainly,
football represents every single demographic. If you talk to ten migrants,

(07:26):
nine of them will say that football is in their
top two sports, it's not their first. And regards of gender, sexuality, age,
football touches every aspect of New Zealand culture and Auckland culture.
We now have an ability to represent that in our
biggest market and our biggest sporting market, and football just

(07:48):
needed something to be proud of, to to invest into.
I think we've got that with Auckland. Equally, if you
look at the all whites, it's probably the most diverse
pain for that we've got in the country. Our traditional
European migrant communities are representing that, Mari Pakier, our more
migrant communities, South Africans, Chinese and Indians are also in there.

(08:11):
And then you've got the PACIFICA community. So I don't
think any other representative team has the ability to say that.

Speaker 2 (08:17):
Jacob Spoonley, thank you so much for your time this morning.

Speaker 1 (08:20):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to News Talks it B from nine am Sunday,
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