Great effort and skill by the Bergers, but I am going with a more unpopular view of games like this in the bigger picture.
It really is still pre-season for the Aleagues teams and there are so many factors at play with tired NPL legs after a ridiculously heavy load, obvious blunt attacks by the unsharpened aleagues teams like the Nix, and green squads in team dynamics against match forged expert teams.
Nix had nothing at the pointy end, despite creating enough chances to make a game of it. They blazed away with useless shots and I would even consider Rufer's shot, that went out for a throw in after being taken in the final third of the field and straight in front, to be the result of players not yet in match form and not just a defender's shot.
Bergers on the other hand were sharp, fast, desperately hungry and proud and mostly ruthless when they had their moments.
I also consider the lack of VAR to be a huge disadvantage to aleagues teams used to it. They play a 'cleaner' game of football because they know they will get hung by their actions. When they get down and dirty in the muddy trenches of NPL, where you sometimes have to drag the player gripping you 10 metres before laying off a pass, and running through swiping legs is a skill, they are often outclassed; having had most of the dark side beaten out of them by a sanitised version of media scrutinised football.
Have you seen Salute of the Jugger? No non-league challenger has ever gone more than 20 stones...
Watching aleagues teams being beaten by 'lower' tier clubs (I acknowledge there are many who do not consider NPL a lower tier really) reminds me of the big game at the end of that movie. The polished pros with all expectation.
And by the final rounds of the Australia Cup we have the balance going back the other way - with NPL clubs out of season and aleagues clubs coming into some form.
These are not excuses and my point is not about today's game - won by an obviously superior skilful and well organised team. It is about any comparison of leagues on the basis of these games. Pit a Round 20 Nix against a Round 20 Bergers and we are talking apples with apples - and I would love to see that happening.
The format and timing of the Cup creates part of the Magic of the Cup. In a game where 90 minutes and a round ball (thanks for the words Mono) can produce any result imaginable or unimaginable, to also have the 'lesser' team in form and the pros still waking up allows for so much more fairness and fantasy.
Roll on the Cup!
Even though those bastard Bergers cost me a tipping point too.
