Besart Berisha hasn't looked as sharp as last season. Credit:Getty Images The departure at the end of last season of former captain Mark Milligan, a dynamic box-to-box midfielder and a leader out on the pitch, was a big blow. But it was one that Muscat's side looked to have covered in the first two months of the campaign as they put themselves amongst the pacesetters and were widely regarded as the team to beat. What has become increasingly clear is that the loss of Milligan's replacement as captain, Carl Valeri, at the end of November, has been the critical disruptive event that has thrown Victory out of its stride. With Valeri at the helm and controlling the tempo on the pitch Victory looked a good bet to become only the second side to win back to back championships. Without him they look dazed and confused, too easily outmuscled in midfield, unable to seize the initiative and incapable of asserting themselves in the way they did last season.

Kosta Barbarouses has shown slightly better form than some of his teammates. Credit:Getty Images The big problem is that their star men are simply not delivering. Fahid Ben Khalfallah was an enormous presence last year, his first in Victory colours, as he danced and dazzled on the wing, creating chances for others and scoring critical goals himself. Skilful, quick and combative, he was a danger to opponents every time he got the ball. Archie Thompson is a facsimile of the player he once was. Credit:Getty Images Out of contract at season's end, he dillied and dallied and flirted with other offers before securing a two year deal – an excellent outcome for a player in his early thirties.

This season, whether through complacency, cussedness, anger at being left out of the Asian Champions League squad or a sharp deterioration in form, Khalfallah is a shadow of the player he was 12 months ago. He struggles to take on and beat opponents, he barely troubles the scorers and even his hard-edged competitiveness has deserted him, too often now looking like petulance. Brazilian Gui Finkler is another who is out of sorts. The silky midfielder made his name as one of the "Fab Four" (Ben Khalfallah, Besart Berisha, Kosta Barbarouses and himself) playing behind the attacking troika and creating the bullets for that trio to fire. Skilful, precise and penetrating with his passes last season, not to mention devastating with set piece deliveries, Finkler also has gone AWOL in recent times. He was upset at once again missing out on Asian Champions League selection, and perhaps that is a reason for his desultory efforts in recent games. The Brazilian is out of contract at season's end and is hardly mounting a compelling case to be re-signed.

Oliver Bozanic was brought in as a marquee player at the start of the season and he is another who has failed to deliver. Lacking in star status or reputation, Bozanic's marquee status smacks of an accounting exercise more than anything else, and the former Socceroo has done little to justify such an exalted position. He is tidy, with good touch and quick feet, but on what we have seen this season he simply lacks the weapons to hurt opponents. His first option is far too often to go backwards or sideways, and he rarely produces the incisive pass or through ball that is required from someone with his experience, pay grade and role in the team. Kosta Barbarouses, while more consistent and dangerous than the aforementioned trio, is also not quite where he was last season. Still, he remains a threat, but the temptation to mentally check out must be there given he has already committed to a big money move back to Wellington Phoenix next season. Berisha has been Berisha. No, he hasn't looked as threatening or as sharp as last season, but he has still notched 16 goals and his workrate cannot be faulted. He harasses, chases, closes down and fights for every ball.

If his big money big name mates showed the same competitiveness that he does, Muscat's side might not be in the hole that it is. Archie Thompson might still attract the chants of the crowd but the songs are for the man Thompson was three and more years ago, not the facsimile that the striker has become. Reduced to cameo roles off the bench, he looks increasingly ineffective when he gets a 20 minute run at the end of the game against tiring defences. His pace, which once made him so elusive, is disappearing – hardly surprising since he turns 38 in October – and the touch and skills which used to allow him to wriggle past defences in tight spots have been blunted, too. Out of contract at the end of this campaign, this will surely be his last season in Victory's navy blue. The coach has come under pressure too and acknowledges that he is taking stick from a fan base used to success and success with style.

Muscat has been criticised for a lack of variation and game style, and it is a valid question to put to him. Mind you, he is not alone in the A-League: most teams, with the exception of the fluid Melbourne City, whom John van 't Schip has educated to shapeshift at a moment's notice, not many sides can change gear quickly or easily. Muscat would argue that his Plan A would still work if his big names were delivering. They are not. His challenge now in the final weeks of the season is to motivate and get them back to where they were. If not, they need to be axed and others given a chance. It might cost Victory in the short term this season, but a major refitting is necessary next year anyway, and Muscat might as well find out as much as he can about some of his younger players. He already has given the likes of Jason Geria, Thomas Deng, Scott Galloway and Dylan Murnane a number of chances. George Howard was used off the bench on Sunday. Deng made the crucial mistake for Newcastle's goal on Sunday – not the first one the teenager has made during his debut season – but that comes with the territory as young centre backs learn the game.

Muscat bit the bullet and dropped Danny Vukovic on Sunday after a shaky season in which the goalkeeper has rarely looked the assured presence he did in Perth. Lawrence Thomas, who is much better with the ball at his feet and playing out from the back, will surely now get a run of games to prove himself between the posts. The biggest boost Victory could get in these last weeks of the season is if a fit-again Valeri could return to action – and if Muscat can persuade Delpierre to sign on again for another season. The Frenchman has indicated he will quit at the end of this one, but if he can be persuaded his body will hold up to the rigours of another A-League year he might stay on. Every Victory fan will be hoping he does, no one more so than the coach.