Lachlan Avil 
Melbourne City 2024/25 A-League season preview. Photo: Provided by Melbourne City. Design: Round Ball Australia
Barely clinging to their streak of A-League Men finals appearances in the 2023/24 season, Melbourne City will look to steady the ship in the upcoming campaign after years of volatility have rocked through the football club.
Both of City’s previous managers, Patrick Kisnorbo and Rado Vidošić, both departed within the opening month and a half of league play in their respective seasons. The former because of his absolute success, the other for his lack of it.
A plethora of young talent stripped away internationally after their three-peat Premiership run, mid-season departures of key players disrupting their momentum in 23/24, and a trio of the clubs best leaving in the current off-season leaves City with many questions to answer if they want to return to the pinnacle and challenge for a second Championship.
The Manager: Aurelio Vidmar
Signing onto a two-year contract after recovering City to a finals position when he took over in an interim manner last season, Aurelio Vidmar is tasked with first and foremost being the sole manager to lead City through an entire A-League season.
In reality, this will not be as difficult as the track record of his predecessors suggests. City ownership had the chance to bring someone in at the end of last season, but they went for the stability and continuity of Vidmar – something that will not be thrown away unless there is a serious lack of competitiveness, which is very unlikely.
Still however, Vidmar is at the helm of the club that since the City Football Group has been involved, have never missed out on playing A-League Men’s finals football – a run that he will not be keen to break.
Well-travelled through Asia as both a player and manager, Vidmar has held head coaching roles at Thailand and Singapore’s top clubs. Such experience in variety he will have to call on to manage a squad dynamic that will demand creative coaching.
The Squad
Three massive off-season departures dominate the squad headlines for Melbourne City. Firstly, the club and league’s all-time record goal scorer, Jamie Maclaren. Some fans may have argued the time to evolve from Macca had come anyway, but his absence will still be felt significantly in the short term regardless.
Then there is the club’s all-time games played record holder, Curtis Good. A club man who was an ever present rock at the heart of the City defence, and will also be sorely missed.
Finally, Tolgay Arslan. The player who many would say was the best in the league last campaign, left in suspicious circumstances over the off-season.
City’s Director of Football, Michael Petrillo publicly announced his frustration at the time of the announcement.
“Whilst it’s very disappointing to lose a player of Tolgay’s quality, especially after the commencement of pre-season training, sometimes there are factors out of our control,” he said.
“He’s a player we absolutely wanted to keep, and we did everything in our power to find a way for him to stay.
“In my 20 years of working in football, I’ve never seen an instance where keeping a player against their will ended up being a positive thing for all involved.”
The club was in a no-win situation. Refusing Arslan’s request would likely not have ended well as Petrillo illuded to, but eyebrows must have been raised when he then signed for Sanfrecce Hiroshima in Japan, having reportedly asked for the release to be closer to home – Germany.
Regardless of nature of the departure, the fact is that City how have to move on without him, Maclaren and Good, as well a few other pieces of A-League quality in Nuno Reis, Scott Galloway and Marin Jakoliš among others.
The return of Aziz Behich from his loan spell and Cristiano Ronaldo’s Al-Nassr will be a boost, as well as Nathaniel Atkinson, who returns to City from Heart of Midlothian in Scotland.
The other notable Australian inclusion is young centre-back Kai Trewin, who impressed last season in a struggling Brisbane Roar outfit.
In addition to a few academy prospects, the focus then turns to the trio of visa inclusions: Andreas Kuen, Yonatan Cohen and German Ferreyra. All in their late 20s, they are all likely key pieces of first team experience that Vidmar will hope provide the base for the younger players to feed off.
Like most A-League imports, they hold a certain mystique around them that won’t fully clear until a few rounds into the season.
All in all, it is a squad that contains significantly more question marks than known quantities. With Mathew Leckie, Max Caputo and Alessandro Lopane all out with injury for round one, Vidmar has a serious task on his hand settling his side into the new season.
The Off-Field: The global conglomerate and an eye on the enemy
Regardless of the financial status of the league, the competitively balanced nature of the competition, or the squad dynamic at any given point in a club’s cycle, being part of the City Football Group (CFG) brings high expectations.
The completed training facility out in Casey is evident of CFG’s longer term vision for the club out in the East of Melbourne, but those kinds of changes take time.
Despite whatever can be made of their playing squad, the higher-ups will still be expecting results.
A much more pressing and intriguing off-field topic is what’s going at cross-town rivals, Melbourne Victory.
With former City captain and Championship manager, Patrick Kisnorbo at the helm, opinions are mixed as to how this crossing of derby impacts his legacy at City.
We will not have to wait too much longer to find out for sure. The crowd’s reception when he walks out for the Melbourne Derby in round two will tell us all we need to know.
Expectations
Like most A-League sides coming into a fresh campaign, ‘in the finals conversation’ is usually the bare minimum of what a team will set out to achieve.
Unfortunately for Melbourne City this time around, pushing for too much more than that as a bare expectation may be pushing the envelope a little bit too far.
The A-League is crazy and anything can happen. But using last season as a reference point, barely making the top six in the final few weeks before losing three of your best players hardly bodes well for anyone.
However, we all said the exact same thing about the Mariners last time around and look what they went onto achieve.