Western Sydney Wanderers Football Club

And then, you know, you, you, you'd hope that Bonnyrigg's not far behind either, and then you've got these old-school rivalries back again.

But I will, I will say in, in terms of the A-League, the Western Sydney Wanderers were incredibly well-supported, and, and I think the feeling with the club, even though it was a brand-new club, was o- maybe not historically on par with, with United and these other clubs, but definitely up there.

I, I went to many games and I could feel it.

I remember the, the Asian Champions League run.

He'll be 18 on May 21st of next year, meaning that he would join the Rapids ahead of the calendar switch 2027, 2028 MLS season.

He has played 14 times at the first team level for Sydney FC, and he spent some time in the youth academy at Western Sydney Wanderers.

Um, he's mostly been playing in Australian Cup games this season, so make of that what you will.

Um, but so far, uh, he's got three assists and 11, in 11 games played in the A-League.

Yeah, then it was...

I can't even remember the order, but, you know, the Sydney Kings, the Giants Netball, the Giants AFLW when that came in, the Western Sydney Wanderers, the New South Wales Waratahs.

So it all, you know, kind of went like that.

And even other teams.

And then obviously you get the kids that then, because they've been developed quite well by the club, they are actually becoming quite talented now.

And so they get to go and play at places like Manly United, Northern Tigers, Spirit FC, St. George, wherever they decide to go, Sydney Wanderers, uh, [laughs] uh, Sydney FC.

And the other ones that are at club level stay at club level, and they keep going through.

So I ca- I coached both my kids through Division One.

For me as a Perth boy, most of it's been pretty bad, but there's been some good moments sprinkled in.

But if you had to define one, maybe... season or maybe a couple of seasons as peak a league which sort of time period would you pick that obviously we had raw salona we've had you know the western sydney wanderers coming in we had the big sort of arrivals of europe from the likes of del pierro hesky we've had plenty of massive periods uh in terms of the a league but what defining era would you say is peak a league

I'm presuming by peak A-League, we're not meaning the sarcastic version.

Yeah, I think that period that you mentioned, I think between 2010 and probably 2015, maybe a bit of 2016, I think that five-year period was when the league was at its absolute peak.

But yeah, I don't want to be too negative in answer to that question.

That five-year period, I thought, was tremendous.

And one small example of it, I did the first ever Sydney Derby between Western Sydney Wanderers and Sydney FC.

I think it was late 2012.