Entries Tagged 'Fred' ↓

After ten days of voting, the A-League Awards wrapped up yesterday afternoon. Thank you to everyone who voted. And a big thank you to the other bloggers who helped nominate players for each category.

Without further ado, here are the winners:

Continue reading →

Carlos Hernandez is not Fred.

Quite the obvious statement really.

But such was the impression Fred made on the A-League last season that commentators are looking at the Melbourne Victory’s struggle to get its first win of the season and pointing the fingers at Hernandez: “He’s not Fred!”

How insightful.

The Central Coast’s Tony Vidmar pointed at the absence of Fred to explain why Melbourne seems to be a shadow of its former self. Jesse Fink from Half Time Orange agrees that Melbourne without Fred is “a totally different proposition”.

Agreed, to an extent. The Victory are a revamped squad (besides Fred, another 7 players from last year’s squad aren’t around any more); and so far, they really don’t look as good as they did last year.

But I think we are over emphasising Fred’s contribution to last year’s team. And I definitely think that Victory supporters are being too harsh to Carlos Hernandez, who has been wrongly cast into Fred’s shoes.

The bloke behind me at the game last Sunday spent much of the match screaming his scorn for a number of players, especially Hernandez. Deriding the Costa Rican for being “fat” (his words, not mine), I wondered whether this was the characteristic sentiment around Victory supporters. Is Hernandez on a fast-track to becoming the proverbial Melbourne scapegoat (a la Danny Allsopp, season 1)?

Unfortunately, Hernandez seems to be judged on the extent to which he can emulate Fred. But let’s get back to the basics: Hernandez is not Fred. Where Fred would run and run and run, Hernandez takes a decidedly different approach. He’s a classy midfielder with a deft touch. We’ve already seen flashes of his brilliance. Sure, he’s not at top-flight. But neither was Fred at this time of the season last year, as Ernie Merrick is keen to point out.

I was very disappointed to see Fred leave. He was, without a doubt, one of the highlight’s of the Melbourne Victory show in 2006-07.

I don’t expect Hernandez to be the new Fred. But I do look forward to watching him come into his own: in short, to play his game, not Fred’s.