We go again, even if the A-League does not get where it wants to go

“We go again” is one of the catchcries of modern football. Almost as soon as the words rushed out of Steven Gerrard’s mouth towards the climax of the 2013-14 English Premier League season they took on a life of their own, becoming shorthand for either pushing on after victory or rebounding following defeat.

The motto has been doing the rounds ahead of the new A-League season, which returns on Sunday in record time, a breezy four months since the last grand final. This is the first step in a welcome transition from a summer to a winter competition, an example of the football-first mantra that has guided James Johnson’s leadership of Football Australia. But in the short term, it means we go again with a paucity of visible marketing and an absence of hype for an opening fixture two days after Christmas, with the Boxing Day Test dominating sports coverage, and a Covid-19 flare-up threatening to once again rob the league of its unique selling point – a vibrant crowd.

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We go again, despite the clubs and the governing body failing to decouple in the off-season, dragging out the years-long administrative wrangling. “We’ve principally unbundled but have not formally unbundled,” remarked Johnson recently, like one of Jane Austen’s clerics. All parties insist the clubs are now running the show but until the phantom umbilical cord is cut uncertainty remains over strategic decision-making and, crucially, how the professional tier and the rest of the pyramid is being funded.

This is acutely pertinent as we go again into a season with a cloud over the financial health of the game. Australian football has been hemorrhaging sponsors for some time and the A-League remains without a naming-rights partner at the start of a season that is scheduled to end without the broadcast revenue upon which it has relied since inception.

What this looks like on the ground is the Newcastle Jets, a club seemingly operating on IOUs, gaffer tape and Lawrie McKinna’s blood, sweat, and tears. We go again into an A-League season with the Jets propped up from outside the Hunter. Already in the last decade Newcastle have had as many licences revoked as finals appearances, and finals appearances seem destined to be playing catch-up in that head-to-head before the end of the season with Martin Lee’s ownership entering Fergie time.

The situation down the F3 is only marginally better. The Central Coast Mariners have been up for sale long enough for a serious buyer to take over but we go again into another campaign during which simply avoiding humiliation would register as progress. Last season’s wooden spoon was their fourth in six seasons. During that time they have celebrated just 26 wins in 161 outings.

At the opposite end of the table we go again with Sydney FC and Melbourne City. Last year’s grand finalists look best equipped to challenge for silverware once more although Steve Corica has the difficult task of replacing Adam Le Fondre’s goals, while Patrick Kisnorbo has the added pressure of cutting his managerial teeth, albeit with the strongest-looking and most balanced squad in the competition.

In between the obvious contenders and also-rans we go again with a pack of teams that all have their up and downsides. Among this cohort, the Western Sydney Wanderers stand out after they snared Carl Robinson from the beleaguered Jets. The Welshman impressed during his short stint in Newcastle and has wasted no time bolstering an already talented, though grossly underperforming, squad. Melbourne Victory are another sleeping giant to have strengthened, with Grant Brebner’s recruitment bearing fruit in the Asian Champions League.

Hot on the heels of Western United, we go again with a new entity, Macarthur FC. Recent start-ups have impressed in their debut campaigns and there is nothing to suggest the Bulls will not do likewise after cobbling together an impressive roster. Alongside blue-chip signings Mark Milligan, Ivan Franjic, and Adam Federici, Macarthur have brought Spaniard Beñat Etxebarria to New South Wales, one of the best-credentialed imports of recent seasons.

The Bulls will be led by Ante Milicic, one of 10 Australian coaches under 50 as we go again with the Covid and cost-cutting measures introduced midway through last season. This particular consequence of the global pandemic is a welcome one, as is the increased responsibility that will be placed on young Australian players to see their teams through a campaign that will begin with only Brisbane Roar taking their full complement of visa spots. Three of the Roar’s foreigners were recruited by former coach Robbie Fowler, the Liverpool legend who played 87 times alongside the progenitor of we go again-isms: Gerrard.

But after the Reds skipper’s stirring address was considered instrumental in his side’s subsequent victory over Norwich, it failed to keep him upright in a heartbreaking defeat to Chelsea, nor did it defend a three-goal lead in the final 11 minutes at Selhurst Park, a night immortalised as Crystanbul. It is entirely apposite for the A-League; we go again, and we will continue to go again, but with the best will in the world, we might not always get where we want to go.