Dennis Gedling blogs on the Perth Glory for BackPageLead. Click here to if you want to join our A-League blog network.

As I get older I have found that some things in life (apart from death and taxes) are guaranteed.

-In every ‘Commando' comic I read as kid a Japanese soldier always yelled "aiieeeeeeeeeee!!!!" when he was bayoneted or blown up by one of our heroic boys.

-Robbie Slater will always try to shoe horn in a mention of the fact that he won a league title with Blackburn Rovers when he appears on Fox Sports FC every week.

-Every washed up Australian musician who appears on ‘Rockwiz' from time to time will mention that they're working on new material.

-There will always be someone at an A-League match who runs down the skill level yet support some awful lower division club from the UK or Ireland who is at the same level at times.

This last ‘guarantee' in life was in full effect at the first Perth Glory home game for the season last Friday night. Seated behind me at the ‘cauldron of fear' (© Bernd Stange 1998) were three new members who had been lured by the scouse siren's song.

Two of these new faces supported Nottingham Forest and reminded themselves and everyone around them of this said fact. These fans still exist people and they need reminding that globalisation is running rampant and we don't really need to hear about how "Cloughie told it like it is". If they had talked about the fact Cloughie was a heavy drinker and a paranoid socialist then at least I would have listened in a half-arsed way. The strange thing is I've never seemed to have had trouble with people from continental Europe when it came to this attitude towards Glory and either the A-League or NSL. All I used to get from the Serb guy who stood in front of me in the NSL days for a couple of seasons was that the referee and Bobby Despotovski were "Blaaardddyy Donkeeees!!!"

The third person in the trio was a condescending Dubliner who sounded just like Barry Glendinning from the brilliant Guardian newspaper podcast ‘Football Weekly' but with about 1/10th of the wit and humour. ‘Plastic Barry' went on about how University College of Dublin could play these teams off the pitch and that's "saying something" but on the evidence of what I saw from the League of Ireland match I saw in 2006 that teams like UCD would have trouble beating Gippsland Falcons from the old NSL let alone North Queensland Fury such was the skill level at times.

They did have reasons to cross their arms and claim that the game was like "pub football" for some hefty periods of the match as Glory were a bombscare at the back. Two long term servants of the club in Jamie Harnwell and Jamie Coyne were put in the centre of defence with three of the better Glory defenders out because of various reasons (dodgy Tony Sage mining deals, injury, Romanian clubs not paying or even allowing the release of Australian players that Glory had signed). This was the Jamie Harnwell who left the club in a blaze of glory when we finally won an NSL title in 2003 with his ‘thanks shed, thanks Perth' shirt on, his career set to soar in Europe after finally winning the metal and wood Homemart-sponsored holy grail for Glory. If you can call ‘soaring in Europe' playing a handful of games for Leyton Orient and non-league Welling United before coming back to Perth then so be it but we always loved him in Perth and took with back with open arms and a little snigger in 2004. Do we love Jamie enough to have him start this season? Maybe not. Jamie Coyne was brilliant in the state league when younger but has never really brought his ‘A-Game' to Glory which has raised the ire of fans. Coyne coupled with Harnwell and ‘King Flap' himself Tando Velpahi in goal meant that a clean sheet was highly unlikely.

"That was awful, who is that number 5?" Perth Glory royalty my Celtic friend.

Naum Sekulovski was there again at left back for Glory and is now a piece of furniture like Nudge was in ‘Hey Dad', goofy and a bit annoying but where would the show be without him. Sorrento product Scott Neville was again fantastic at right back with a goal to top it all off after a well worked corner.

"Poor defending that. That young bugger has done nothing all night and he gets a goal for it now."

No pleasing some it seemed.

The central midfield of Jacob Burns and Steven McGarry was all kick and rush which has semi-effective so our three new friends should have been at home seeing as that's the old British/Irish way of playing?

"Can't these buggers find each other with a pass? Bloody hell!"

No, apparently not.

Adriano Pellegrino on the right wing was actually quite good on the night which is why we hate him, his inconsistency is consistent as his male pattern baldness. This was the player who, in the off-season, had apparently told the Scottish press that he had rejected Glasgow Celtic to try out with Motherwell yet didn't get a contract with them either so he had in fact ‘done a Jamie' and ended up back at Glory. His set up for Mile Sterjovski to score Glory's third goal was sublime though it must be said. Speaking of Sterjovski, he set up one goal and scored another so he's getting to even half of what a marquee player could do but again for David Mitchell he is a problem child. Where do you put him? Where does he fit in the formation? Is he effective on the wings or plod up front? He is a mystery wrapped in an enigma.

"Mile Whatsisface" was what our Australian marquee signing was referred to by the triplets grim behind me.

Robbie Fowler had a brilliant first touch that was a level above anyone else on the pitch. Not sure where the Fowler hate came from in the paper the next day but then again the Saturday paper in Perth loves a good bit of controversy for the sake of it. Fowler was who the new boys were here to see and he didn't escape a comment or two.

"Fowler could still do it back home you know."

"Yeah, but in the conference."

"Yeah, the conference, just saying like."

Conference league level Robbie's strike partner in Branko Jelic scored early and didn't do much else but he's a goal poacher and not doing much is what he does for large parts of the game. If this guy can stay fit then he will score goals and quite a few of them for Glory. Let's hope that heart muscle transplant he had in the off-season means he won't pull said muscle again this season when the going gets tough.

Not the best start to the season but the momentum coming in to the first game hasn't exactly been the best with the lack of defenders and a new signing out. The off-field problems were also being bitched about with the sell out rumour being a myth and the precious members bar (that seems to be put on a pedestal more than winning an A-League title) being moved. If we leak goals like this well in to the season I may well be the one yelling out "bloody pub league level that is!" come December but I can only hope the team spites my new friends behind me and start to get it together.

Francis Leach was dead right on the ABC TV program ‘Offsiders' a couple of weeks ago when he said this was a very important season for the A-League with a new team and being after another World Cup. The same can be said in spades for Glory with the Fowler signing and willingness by many to take them back in to their hearts or even attract new ‘fans' even if they are treating watching the A-League like watching their kids play subbuteo. Let's pray for a draw and some kind of coherent defensive display at the dear new rectangular stadium in Melbourne against the Victory on Saturday night.

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