Below, we reflect on the Seniors first season under new coach Bill Kotsabouikis, who flirted with promotion for much of the season.

It took two departed Senior Coaches, and months of hard work, to construct Old Carey SC’s most successful season since the promoted side of 2008, and for the first time in the clubs history, they spent much of the season challenging for the top positions in Provisional 2 S/E.  Unfortunately, it only took 5 games to tear Old Carey’s promotion dream apart.

For the past two seasons, Old Carey had fallen into the category of ‘easybeats’, and were better known as a ‘schoolboy’ side.  Season 2011 went some way to erasing those misperceptions. 

A pre-season of mixed results had left many at the club wondering what direction Old Carey would be heading in in 2011.  Coupled with a limited pre-season for most at Old Carey, together with the absence of key player Daniel MacDonald for many of the opening rounds, no one knew what to expect from Old Carey – including the players and the coaching staff. 

Bill Kotsabouikis had added to his squad during the off season, with Guy de Vos returning from his boyhood club Eltham Redbacks, bringing with him the young and talented Monty Mehdi (Eltham), and Marco Manciano (Riversdale).  Much needed experience was also added to the squad, with Greg Costaras (Monash) joining former assistant coach David Thompson in the senior squad.  Bang Nguyen was also a welcome addition to the squad, bolstering Old Carey’s midfield strength. 

It seems a long time ago that Old Carey travelled out bush to kick off their campaign, and the Provisional 2 S/E Season at Monbulk, under lights on Friday night.  Old Carey crashed Monbulks return to the league with an unexpected, and now infamous, 2-1 win in front of Melbourne Victory front man Danny Allsopp.

The question marks over Old Carey’s lack of mental fortitude (they had only one once picked up maximum points when conceding first in 2010) was nowhere to be seen during the first half of the season.  In fact, it was the complete opposite.  A 2-1 win away from home in front of a boisterous Monbulk crowd, a 4-3 win at the death against bitter rivals Boroondara (coming from 3-2 down in the last 10 minutes), and traditionally tricky trips to Caulfield and Keysborough brought victory.  At the midway point, Old Carey were tracking early pacesetters Monbulk at the top of the table and, much to everyone’s surprise, were well and truly in the promotion race.

The noisiest accusation, and one which had haunted Old Carey for the past few seasons, was this: Old Carey are too inconsistent.  Despite being in the top 2 at the midway point, the stats bore this out, especially after Old Carey’s thrashing at the hands of Monbulk.  At the midway point, Old Carey’s biggest winning streak was 2, and they had only strung 3 games undefeated once.  Big wins away (i.e. Monbulk) were usually followed the subsequent week by poor results (i.e. Casey). 

However, Old Carey had one factor in their favour: they were excellent travellers.  After 11 games, Old Carey had played 7 away from home, picking up 5 wins and a draw, for a total of 16 points out of a possible 21.  In fact, no one in the league could match Old Carey’s away form – and if Old Carey could get their home form on track, who knows where they could end up.

Those criticism further came to hand between 16 July 2011 and 13 August 2011, during which time Old Carey suffered 5 straight losses to Endeavour United, Ashburton, Riversdale, Seaford United and, worst of all, Boroondara Eagles. 

At the end of that stretch, Old Carey had fallen from 2nd to the bottom quarter of the table and somehow now found themselves facing a possible relegation fight – something which had seemed impossible a mere month beforehand.

However, coupled with the additions of Jeremy Schwellinger and the influential Diego Lorenzo, Old Carey managed to turn things around and finish the season off strongly. 

In fact, for the first time since season 2008, Old Carey were able to string together 4 straight, and big wins.  All of the results were quite remarkable in themselves: including beating Uni of Melbourne 1-0 after playing the final 30 minutes with 9 men on the pitch, and beating Bayside Argonauts 5-2 after being 0-2 at half time.

That strong finish propelled Old Carey into third place, and will help provide momentum for a strong 2012 campaign.