By Alyce Collett 22/4/25
Above: Brisbane Roar vs Melbourne Victory. Photo: Bec Hartley for Impetus
An at times frustrating season for the Brisbane Roar came to an end on the weekend with a 2-0 away loss to the Melbourne Victory. Alyce Collett spoke to the coach after the final whistle.
A reflective Roar coach Alex Smith spoke to the media afterwards, noting that even without finals to fight for anymore, there were still plenty of factors motivating the Roar on the weekend.
“Anytime you put on a club jersey, you need to play with pride,” Smith said.
“We had a couple of retirees as well, so you try and use that as motivation.
“I thought first half we were good value. We had plenty of possession in the final third, just lacked that little bit of composure in class to create those chances.
“Obviously getting hit with a goal just before we have time isn’t ideal, and then the red card is a whole other talking point.”
That red card Smith mentioned was the one given at the hour mark to midfielder Momo Hayashi, which did not have a clear reason in the moment.
“ Apparently, at least what I’ve been told it was contact with the referee,” Smith explained.
“ If anybody knows Momo, she’s the nicest, kindest soul you’ll ever meet and barely speaks English and doesn’t get angry at anybody. I haven’t seen it but I trust someone like Momo with my children and she says it wasn’t much.”
Smith also confirmed that the Roar will be appealing the card, and is feeling ”fairly confident it’ll get overturned on appeal, just because of the player it is.”
The focus for the Roar now turns to the offseason, and reflecting on a season that might have been.
Smith reflected on the challenges his side has faced in the second half of the campaign, noting that “I haven’t had the same starting lineup in 2025, so injuries played a huge part. We lost some key players, we had eight or nine players missed at least six games, something like that.”
“So nothing you can do about that, but I think a lot will go into to recruitment next year and making sure we have the depth so that if something like this happens again, we’re able to cover.
“It’s a slippery slope sometimes when you start playing poorly and you low on confidence and things happen, red cards happen, ball doesn’t go your way. I mean, most of the goals that we’ve conceded, especially this year, have been from sort of our mistakes.
“So that’s something we definitely need to address in the off season, but it makes it really hard to have any sort of consistency when you’re constantly chopping and changing and playing different formations to suit who you have available.”
Recruiting depth ahead of the 2025/26 season will be one of Smith’s key focuses, but he was not giving away too much after the match on Saturday.
“I still need to have some conversations with the club around a few other things, so until that happens, I’m not going to really comment on who I’d like to bring in or who I’d like to keep and all that sort of stuff” he said.
“We’ll go through a process as we always do, and review the season and go over every individual and figure out where we need to improve and hopefully we can do that.”
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