Rugby has its scrum half, NFL the quarterback, but the concept of a creative force behind all of the play is quite a foreign concept in football. The playmaking duties from a defensive point of view are normally left to the deep-lying playmaker in midfield, think the Toni Kroos’, the Andrea Pirlos. To re-envisage what it is to be a playmaker is a bold move, and at Bundoora, the frameworks have been torn down and rebuilt.
The cornerstone of their success so far in 2015 has been the ease at which their defence has impacted the play, not just by shutting out their opponents, but in adding drive from all four positions up the field and taking risks in using the ball, knowing that there is ample quality sat behind them ready to pounce should that risk not pay off.
They say the best defence is a good offence, but it appears quite the contrary is working for Bundoora at the minute, and their vice-captain Gulcan Koca has been a key figure in the movement.
“I think it’s awesome because I get to see more of the field so I don’t have to worry about what’s behind me. I have Beth [Mason-Jones] who’s got my back,” Koca says about the system Bundoora have in place.
“That’s always a good thing. We’ve got so much quality in the team, where the majority of the team is so versatile that we can play in any position and I’m really enjoying centre-back and directing the team from there. I think it’s a good spot for me at the moment.”
Koca nor defensive partner Claudia Fruscazo would call themselves natural centre-backs, nor would Jess Pitts who has also filled the gap this season, but at the moment it doesn’t seem to matter, as the most daunting figure for opposition sides is knowing that the killer ball can come from not only the midfield, but almost anywhere on the pitch.
“We encourage both [Koca and Fruscazo] to get forward as often as they can because we know what it creates. It causes problems for teams and we’ve got confidence that when one gets forward, the other will be sitting back,” says Bundoora’s co-coach Mark Torcaso.
“We feel safe, so we’re confident that we can get the one forward, whether it’s G [Gulan] or Claudia and we can actually build something from that, and that’s the most positive thing.”
It’s paid dividends this year as Bundoora have worked on stifling opponents through their ball movement. As the old adage goes, if you don’t have the ball, you can’t do anything with it, and so it’s proved for the wave of unsuccessful opponents to face the ladder leaders so far.
The ease at which they’ve flowed through contests – albeit they were pushed to the death in their match against Sandringham on the weekend – seems more akin to a training exercise, and there’s little doubt that the understanding between the players plays a massive part in that. Koca describes her team as a “family”, and believes that because of that connection, it’s an easy group to help lead.
“Everyone does everything for each other. If someone isn’t feeling up to it or feeling down, we make sure that we pick each other up and keep going. The girls make it really easy for me so I don’t really have to lead, it’s just helping each other out when some information needs to be given.”
Koca also admits the need to break the shackles of what it is to be a defender. The backing of her coaching staff has certainly helped in their pursuit for the WPL’s equivalence of total football.
“[The coaches] encourage us to play football. We don’t want to be that stereotypical defence where you get the ball then boot it long,” she says. “If we did that, it’d get pretty boring in defence, so we try to stay switched on and get involved in the game and have as much part of it as everyone else.”
“We’re just trying to show the rest of the league that we’re trying to play football, the beautiful game. It’s the highest league in Victoria, we want to make it the best we can be. We want to try and breed as many players as we can for the W-League. If we don’t start here, where’s it going to come from?”
Photo: Matt Johnson