2011–12 A-League

A-League

Season	2011–12
Dates	8 October 2011 – 22 April 2012
Champions	Brisbane Roar (2nd title)
Premiers	Central Coast Mariners (2nd title)
Champions League	Central Coast Mariners Brisbane Roar
Matches played	135
Goals scored	365 (2.7 per match)
Top goalscorer	Besart Berisha (19 goals)
Best goalkeeper	Mathew Ryan
Biggest home win	Brisbane Roar 7–1 Adelaide United (28 October 2011)
Biggest away win	Adelaide United 0–4 Central Coast Mariners (2 December 2011) Sydney FC 0–4 Melbourne Heart (29 December 2011)
Highest scoring	Brisbane Roar 7–1 Adelaide United (28 October 2011) Perth Glory 4–2 Melbourne Victory (24 March 2012)
Longest winning run	Central Coast Mariners (6)
Longest unbeaten run	Central Coast Mariners (15)
Longest winless run	Gold Coast United (13)
Longest losing run	Brisbane Roar Gold Coast United (5)
Highest attendance	40,351
Lowest attendance	1,141
Average attendance	10,488 ( 2,095)
← 2010–11 2012–13 →

The 2011–12 A-League was the 35th season of top-flight soccer in Australia, and the seventh season of the Australian A-League soccer competition since its establishment in 2004. At the end of the previous season, the North Queensland Fury were cut from the competition by the governing body, Football Federation Australia, due to financial reasons.^[1]

Team	City	Home Ground	Capacity
Adelaide United	Adelaide	Hindmarsh Stadium	17,000
Brisbane Roar	Brisbane	Suncorp Stadium	52,500
Central Coast Mariners	Gosford	Bluetongue Stadium	20,119
Gold Coast United	Gold Coast	Skilled Park	27,400
Melbourne Heart	Melbourne	AAMI Park	30,050
Melbourne Victory	Melbourne	Etihad Stadium AAMI Park	55,000 30,050
Newcastle Jets	Newcastle	Ausgrid Stadium	33,000
Perth Glory	Perth	NIB Stadium	20,500
Sydney FC	Sydney	Sydney Football Stadium	45,500
Wellington Phoenix	Wellington	Westpac Stadium	36,000

Team	Manager	Captain	Kit manufacturer	Jersey sponsor
Adelaide United	John Kosmina	Eugene Galeković	Erreà	Coopers
Brisbane Roar	Ange Postecoglou	Matt Smith	Puma	The Coffee Club
Central Coast Mariners	Graham Arnold	Alex Wilkinson	Hummel	Soccer5s
Gold Coast United	Mike Mulvey	Michael Thwaite	Fi-ta	Hyatt Regency Coolum
Melbourne Heart	John van 't Schip	Fred	ISC	Westpac
Melbourne Victory	Jim Magilton	Adrian Leijer	Adidas[2]	Adecco
Newcastle Jets	Gary van Egmond	Jobe Wheelhouse	ISC	Hunter Ports
Perth Glory	Ian Ferguson	Jacob Burns	X-blades	QBE Insurance
Sydney FC	Vítězslav Lavička	Terry McFlynn	Adidas	UNICEF
Wellington Phoenix	Ricki Herbert	Andrew Durante	Adidas	Sony

Team	Outgoing manager	Manner of departure	Date of vacancy	Position in table	Incoming manager	Date of appointment
Newcastle Jets	Branko Čulina	Sacked	4 October 2011[3]	Pre-season	Gary van Egmond	20 October 2011[4]
Adelaide United	Rini Coolen	Sacked	18 December 2011[citation needed]	9th	John Kosmina	18 December 2011[citation needed]
Melbourne Victory	Mehmet Durakovic	Sacked	6 January 2012[5]	8th	Jim Magilton	7 January 2012[6]
Gold Coast United	Miron Bleiberg	Sacked/Resigned	19 February 2012[7][8]	10th	Mike Mulvey	20 February 2012[9]

Club	Visa 1	Visa 2	Visa 3	Visa 4	Visa 5	Non-Visa foreigner(s)	Former player(s)
Adelaide United	Cássio	Sergio van Dijk	Yevhen Levchenko	Francisco Usúcar		Ricardo1
Brisbane Roar	Besart Berisha	Sayed Mohamed Adnan	Henrique	Issey Nakajima-Farran	Thomas Broich	Jack Hingert2
Central Coast Mariners	John Sutton	Patrick Zwaanswijk	Michael McGlinchey			John Hutchinson2 Brad McDonald2
Gold Coast United	Robson	Adama Traoré	Paul Beekmans	Peter Jungschläger	Maceo Rigters	Ante Rožić2 Samuel Tesfagabr1 Ambesager Yosief1 Glen Moss2	Jonas Salley1 Alex Smith
Melbourne Heart	Jonatan Germano	Fred	Maycon	Alex Terra	Rutger Worm
Melbourne Victory	Fábio	Carlos Hernández	Jean Carlos Solórzano	Marco Rojas	Ubay Luzardo	Grant Brebner1
Newcastle Jets	Tiago	Michael Bridges	Francis Jeffers	Jeremy Brockie	Byun Sung-hwan	Ali Abbas1
Perth Glory	Billy Mehmet	Liam Miller	Bas van den Brink	Victor Sikora	Steven McGarry	Andrezinho3 Shane Smeltz2 Ndumba Makeche1
Sydney FC	Bruno Cazarine	Juho Mäkelä	Hirofumi Moriyasu	Pascal Bosschaart	Karol Kisel	Terry McFlynn1
Wellington Phoenix	Paul Ifill	Chris Greenacre	Dani Sánchez	Tony Warner	Alex Smith	Daniel1 Manny Muscat2

The following do not fill a Visa position:
¹Those players who were born and started their professional career abroad but have since gained Australian Residency (and New Zealand Residency, in the case of Wellington Phoenix);
²Australian residents (and New Zealand residents, in the case of Wellington Phoenix) who have chosen to represent another national team;
³Injury Replacement Players, or National Team Replacement Players;
⁴Guest Players (eligible to play a maximum of ten games)

Club	Australian Marquee	International Marquee	Junior Marquee	Captain	Vice-Captain
Adelaide United	Dario Vidosic[10][11]	Sergio van Dijk[12]	None	Jon McKain[13] Eugene Galekovic[note 1][14]	Cássio[14]
Brisbane Roar	None	None	None	Matt Smith[15]	Shane Stefanutto[15]
Central Coast Mariners	None	None	Oliver Bozanic[16]	Alex Wilkinson[17]	None
Gold Coast United	None	None	Tahj Minniecon[18][19]	Michael Thwaite[20]	Paul Beekmans[20] Glen Moss[20]
Melbourne Heart	None	Fred[21]	None	Fred[22][21]	Matt Thompson[23]
Melbourne Victory	Archie Thompson[24][25]	Harry Kewell[26]	None	Adrian Leijer[27]	Archie Thompson[citation needed]
Newcastle Jets	None	None	None	Jobe Wheelhouse[28]	Kasey Wehrman[29]
Perth Glory	Mile Sterjovski[30]	Shane Smeltz[31]	None	Jacob Burns[32]	Chris Coyne[33]
Sydney FC	Nick Carle[34]	Brett Emerton[35]	None	Terry McFlynn[36]	Alex Brosque[36]
Wellington Phoenix	None	None	None	Andrew Durante[37]	Tim Brown[37]

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Central Coast Mariners	27	15	6	6	40	24	+16	51	Qualification for 2013 AFC Champions League group stage and finals series[a]
2	Brisbane Roar (C)	27	14	7	6	50	28	+22	49	Qualification for 2013 AFC Champions League qualifying play-off and finals series
3	Perth Glory	27	13	4	10	40	35	+5	43	Qualification for Finals series
4	Wellington Phoenix	27	12	4	11	34	32	+2	40
5	Sydney FC	27	10	8	9	37	42	−5	38
6	Melbourne Heart	27	9	10	8	35	34	+1	37
7	Newcastle Jets	27	10	5	12	38	41	−3	35
8	Melbourne Victory	27	6	11	10	35	43	−8	29
9	Adelaide United	27	5	10	12	26	44	−18	25
10	Gold Coast United	27	4	9	14	30	42	−12	21

The 2011–12 season saw each team play 27 games, host 13 and play 1 regional game over 25 rounds. On 4 January, over 11 hours of soccer was broadcast with all matches aired back to back starting in Wellington and ending in Perth. The season began on 8 October 2011 and concluded on 22 April 2012. All times are local unless otherwise stated.

Midweek Fixture^{[note 2]}

Midweek Fixture

Midweek Fixture

Midweek Fixture

Midweek Fixture

Postponed Round 17 Fixture^{[note 3]}

Abbreviation and Color Key: Adelaide United – AU Brisbane Roar – BR Central Coast Mariners – CCM Gold Coast United – GCU Melbourne Heart – MH Melbourne Victory – MV Newcastle Jets – NJ Perth Glory – PG Sydney FC – SFC Wellington Phoenix – WP Win Loss Draw Home
Club	Match
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	30
Adelaide United	PG	MV	SFC	BR	MH	GCU	WP	NUJ	CCM	MV	GCU	SFC	WP	MH	BR	MV	CCM	NUJ	PG	WP	GCU	SFC	NUJ	PG	BR	CCM	MH
	1–0	1–0	1–2	7–1	1–1	1–2	1–1	0–0	0–4	1–1	0–3	2–2	2–0	1–3	1–1	1–1	3–2	1–1	0–3	1–2	1–2	1–2	1–0	0–2	1–1	1–0	1–1	|	|	|
Brisbane Roar	CCM	SFC	GCU	AU	MV	WP	NUJ	PG	SFC	MH	WP	CCM	GCU	MV	PG	AU	SFC	MH	NUJ	CCM	WP	MV	PG	MH	AU	NUJ	GCU
	1–0	0–2	3–0	7–1	2–2	1–1	1–2	4–0	2–0	1–2	2–0	1–2	1–0	3–1	3–3	1–1	2–1	1–1	0–1	0–2	0–2	3–2	0–3	1–1	1–1	1–2	1–2	|	|	|
Central Coast Mariners	BR	GCU	NUJ	PG	WP	MV	SFC	MH	AU	NUJ	BR	PG	GCU	MV	SFC	NUJ	MH	AU	GCU	BR	MV	WP	MH	SFC	PG	AU	WP
	1–0	1–1	1–0	2–1	1–2	0–0	2–3	3–1	0–4	2–0	1–2	1–3	0–0	2–0	0–1	1–1	0–1	3–2	3–3	0–2	2–1	2–0	1–0	1–1	1–0	1–0	1–2	|	|	|
Gold Coast United	WP	CCM	BR	NUJ	SFC	AU	MH	MV	PG	SFC	AU	BR	CCM	NUJ	MH	WP	SFC	CCM	MV	PG	AU	MH	MV	WP	NUJ	PG	BR
	1–1	1–1	3–0	3–1	3–2	1–2	1–2	3–2	2–0	0–0	0–3	1–0	0–0	3–2	1–1	0–1	2–1	3–3	1–1	4–0	1–2	1–0	1–1	2–0	1–1	3–0	1–2	|	|	|
Melbourne Heart	NUJ	PG	MV	SFC	AU	NUJ	GCU	CCM	WP	BR	PG	MV	SFC	AU	GCU	PG	CCM	BR	WP	MV	NUJ	GCU	CCM	BR	WP	SFC	AU
	3–2	1–2	0–0	1–1	1–1	3–0	1–2	3–1	1–0	1–2	1–2	3–2	0–4	1–3	1–1	1–2	0–1	1–1	3–1	0–0	3–0	1–0	1–0	1–1	1–1	2–2	1–1	|	|	|
Melbourne Victory	SFC	AU	MH	WP	BR	CCM	PG	GCU	NUJ	AU	WP	MH	BR	CCM	NUJ	AU	PG	SFC	GCU	MH	CCM	BR	GCU	NUJ	SFC	WP	PG
	0–0	1–0	0–0	1–2	2–2	0–0	2–2	3–2	3–1	1–1	3–1	3–2	3–1	2–0	2–1	1–1	4–1	2–2	1–1	0–0	2–1	3–2	1–1	1–3	1–0	3–0	4–2	|	|	|
Newcastle Jets	MH	WP	CCM	GCU	PG	MH	BR	AU	MV	CCM	SFC	WP	PG	GCU	MV	CCM	WP	AU	BR	SFC	MH	PG	AU	MV	GCU	BR	SFC
	3–2	2–0	1–0	3–1	2–0	3–0	1–2	0–0	3–1	2–0	1–2	5–2	1–1	3–2	2–1	1–1	0–1	1–1	0–1	2–5	3–0	2–0	1–0	1–3	1–1	1–2	3–2	|	|	|
Perth Glory	AU	MH	WP	CCM	NUJ	SFC	MV	BR	GCU	SFC	WP	MH	CCM	NUJ	BR	WP	MH	MV	AU	GCU	SFC	NUJ	BR	AU	CCM	GCU	MV
	1–0	1–2	1–0	2–1	2–0	0–1	2–2	4–0	2–0	1–1	1–0	1–2	1–3	1–1	3–3	0–1	1–2	4–1	0–3	4–0	2–1	2–0	0–3	0–2	1–0	0–3	4–2	|	|	|
Sydney FC	MV	BR	AU	MH	GCU	PG	CCM	WP	BR	PG	GCU	NUJ	AU	MH	WP	CCM	BR	GCU	MV	NUJ	PG	AU	WP	CCM	MV	MH	NUJ
	0–0	0–2	1–2	1–1	3–2	0–1	2–3	2–1	2–0	1–1	0–0	1–2	2–2	0–4	4–2	0–1	2–1	2–1	2–2	2–5	2–1	1–2	0–1	1–1	1–0	2–2	3–2	|	|	|
Wellington Phoenix	GCU	NUJ	PG	MV	CCM	BR	AU	SFC	MH	PG	BR	MV	NUJ	AU	SFC	PG	GCU	NUJ	MH	AU	BR	CCM	SFC	GCU	MH	MV	CCM
	1–1	2–0	1–0	1–2	1–2	1–1	1–1	2–1	1–0	1–0	2–0	3–1	5–2	2–0	4–2	0–1	0–1	0–1	3–1	1–2	0–2	2–0	0–1	2–0	1–1	3–0	1–2	|	|	|

---

Brisbane Roar won 5–2 on aggregate.

---

As of end of regular season

Rank	Player	Club	Goals
1	Besart Berisha	Brisbane Roar	19
2	Shane Smeltz	Perth Glory	13
3	Carlos Hernández	Melbourne Victory	10
4	Eli Babalj	Melbourne Heart	9
	Jeremy Brockie	Newcastle Jets
	Ryan Griffiths	Newcastle Jets
	Mitch Nichols	Brisbane Roar
8	Bruno Cazarine	Sydney FC	8
	Harry Kewell	Melbourne Victory
	Sergio van Dijk	Adelaide United

As of end of regular season

Player		Team	Against	Week
	Nigel Boogaard	Adelaide United	Wellington Phoenix	7
	Vince Lia	Wellington Phoenix	Melbourne Victory	11
	Byun Sung-Hwan	Newcastle Jets	Melbourne Victory	14
	Byun Sung-Hwan	Newcastle Jets	Melbourne Victory	14
	Adama Traoré	Gold Coast United	Perth Glory	18
	Nigel Boogaard	Adelaide United	Gold Coast United	19

These are the attendance records of each of the teams at the end of the home and away season. The table does not include finals series attendances.

Team	Hosted	Average	High	Low	Total
Melbourne Victory	13	20,281	40,351	11,231	263,648
Brisbane Roar	13	13,387	19,339	9,293	174,033
Newcastle Jets	13	12,117	17,245	9,311	157,518
Sydney FC	14	11,861	18,180	5,505	166,052
Central Coast Mariners	13	9,607	14,838	6,883	124,892
Melbourne Heart	14	9,082	26,579	2,951	127,142
Adelaide United	14	8,797	14,573	2,363	123,160
Wellington Phoenix	14	8,691	20,078	3,898	121,677
Perth Glory	13	8,315	12,358	6,484	108,101
Gold Coast United	14	3,546	6,927	1,141	49,649
{{{T11}}}	0	0	0	0	0
{{{T12}}}	0	0	0	0	0
League total	135	10,488	40,351	1,141	1,415,872

Updated to the 25 March 2012 note: Adelaide United's lowest crowd was at Bathurst's Carrington Park(NSW) as part of the regional round fixtures.

Attendance	Round	Date	Home	Score	Away	Venue	Weekday	Time of Day
50,334	GF	22 April 2012	Brisbane Roar	2–1	Perth Glory	Suncorp Stadium	Sunday	Afternoon
40,351	1	8 October 2011	Melbourne Victory	0–0	Sydney FC	Etihad Stadium	Saturday	Night
39,309	3	22 October 2011	Melbourne Victory	0–0	Melbourne Heart	Etihad Stadium	Saturday	Night
26,579	12	23 December 2011	Melbourne Heart	3–2	Melbourne Victory	AAMI Park	Friday	Night
26,395	18	4 February 2012	Melbourne Heart	0–0	Melbourne Victory	AAMI Park	Saturday	Night
24,820	5	5 November 2011	Melbourne Victory	2–2	Brisbane Roar	Etihad Stadium	Saturday	Night
20,959	15	13 January 2012	Melbourne Victory	1–1	Adelaide United	AAMI Park	Friday	Night
20,078	7	19 November 2011	Wellington Phoenix	1–1	Adelaide United	Eden Park	Saturday	Afternoon
20,053	17	26 January 2012	Melbourne Victory	2–2	Sydney FC	AAMI Park	Thursday	Afternoon
19,339	8	26 November 2011	Brisbane Roar	4–0	Perth Glory	Suncorp Stadium	Saturday	Night

Updated to end of Week 17, 2 February 2012 The Fair Play Award will go to the team with the lowest points on the fair play table at the conclusion of the home and away season.

1 point		Yellow Card
2 points		Second Caution Red Card
3 points		Direct Red Card

Team				Points
Adelaide United	44	2	0	48
Brisbane Roar	30	0	1	33
Central Coast Mariners	33	0	0	33
Gold Coast United	38	2	0	42
Melbourne Heart	35	1	0	37
Melbourne Victory	34	2	4	50
Newcastle Jets	41	1	1	46
Perth Glory	35	0	3	44
Sydney FC	48	0	1	51
Wellington Phoenix	32	2	2	42
Melbourne Heart	0	0	0	0
Sydney Rovers	0	0	0	0
Totals	370	10	12

• Wellington Phoenix's Nick Ward was given a straight red card that was later rescinded by the Match Review Panel.

• Johnny Warren Medal – Thomas Broich, Brisbane Roar
• NAB Young Footballer of the Year – Mathew Ryan^{[note 4]}, Central Coast Mariners
• Nike Golden Boot Award – Besart Berisha, Brisbane Roar, 19 Goals
• Goalkeeper of the Year – Mathew Ryan, Central Coast Mariners
• Manager of the Year – Graham Arnold, Central Coast Mariners
• Fair Play Award – Brisbane Roar
• Referee of the Year – Jarred Gillett
• Foreign Player of the Year – Thomas Broich, Brisbane Roar
• Solo Goal of the Year – Carlos Hernández, Melbourne Victory FC (Melbourne Victory v Central Coast Mariners, 10-Feb-12)

Formation: 3–4–3^[42]

• 2011 Australian football code crowds