2026-27 Australian Championship Preview

We have got o- already out this week our, our interviews with the Brisbane Roar men's and women's co- men's and women's coaches, Michael Valkanis and John O'Keeffe, as well as Kurt's interview with the Chief Operating Officer, Zach Anderson.

Today, on Thursday, we're gonna look ahead to the Australian Championship, which does kick off tonight down south.

Uh, season two of the competition.

And if it's at in... as good as season one was, Kurt, it'll be a fantastic couple of weeks here with some very aspirational clubs all around the country.

Yes, Scott, it's gonna be a very intriguing season two for the Australian Championship.

Obviously with our Queensland representative there in Lions FC will represent Queensland very, very well.

And Adam, with their group, it's gonna be a very, very interesting group because there's some good, good, uh, good teams in there.

I think the word diverse comes to mind.

Uh, again, as you said, uh, as Preston Lions, uh, are gonna be, uh, very, very strong in that.

But, uh, you'd expect Lions to match up very, very well with Wollongong Wolves and S- and South, South Hobart.

They're, they're the two, their two other group match.

But again, uh, they're, they're not the easiest and as straightforward ties, especially away from home, so.

But it, it could be a case of we're speaking on Lions', uh, chances.

Uh, it, it could be Rocks Diamonds, because I do think they are, they are capable, and they could even potentially take points off Preston u- up, up here in, in Brisbane.

We'll come onto Lions later on in the show.

But we did see last year Morton City did very well in this competition, Kurt.

They got through to the semifinal before falling to Marconi down there in Sydney, in a very tight contest down there.

So Queensland sides have done very well in this competition last year.

We've also seen in the old NPL National Final Series, the, the final three years of that competition, Queensland sides did get through to the final of that, including Lions in back-to-back years.

So Queensland have done very well in this competition.

So hopefully we can see another very strong showing this year from Lions FC as they make their debut in this iteration of the competition.

It was a very impressive campaign by, um, Cam and his boys with Morton City.

The way that they did it too, the, the, the drama that, that occurred, es- especially with the, their final game too, with, um, Luka Jovanovic getting a, um, uh, getting a brace and s- especially scoring that, that equalizing goal too that, that put them through to the knockout stages.

Um, again, coming up s- against some very, very good sides too.

They were, of course, written off by, um, the, by the press, by the local media.