Melbourne Victory interim head coach Steve Kean was happy for his players after a 6-1 win over Western United on Friday.
Victory beat Western United for the first time after a brace from Elvis Kamsoba and goals from Jake Brimmer, Rudy Gestede, Ben Folami and Jacob Butterfield at AAMI Park.
Speaking at his post-match news conference, Kean was pleased to see his players get rewarded in a game played behind closed doors due to a coronavirus outbreak in Melbourne.
on the game…
“You’ve seen the games over the last number of weeks and we’ve been knocking on the door, I’ve sounded a little bit like a broken down record saying we’re doing the right things, chances are coming, expect the goals to come and just sometimes if you get a lead and there’s a bit of confidence floods through the team, then we keep doing the things that we have been doing every day in training. I thought we were excellent in the wide areas, creating chances and really taking them, which is more important. We’ve been creating plenty of late and not really grabbing them at the right opportunities, tonight we did and we limited the opposition to very few real clear-cut chances, I think they had a few half-chances, but overall I thought we were deserving of the points and maybe another goal or two, but let’s not be greedy.”
on whether he felt it coming…
“It’s been coming for weeks. I think sometimes when I’ve sat here and have said, ‘We’ve got shots, we’ve got possession, we’ve got final-third entries etc’, that’s not anything fake. Those stats were there and then tonight the possession I would suggest probably the opposition have maybe got 60 per cent possession but that was intentional to open up space in behind and then try and hit behind their wing-backs before they changed to the back four. I felt every time we got the ball wide we looked like scoring because Ben Folami and Elvis have done great, moving Callum McManaman in behind Rudy Gestede just to give a little bit more of a second striker feel as opposed to a wide player playing as a number 10, I think that worked for Callum, he was really effective and unlucky with the bend the one where he cut inside early on and it’s kind of hit the post-crossbar so he was excellent. But we didn’t have a bad player on the pitch tonight, I think everybody gave their bit and I’m happy for the players, just disappointed the fans and the members are not here because I’m sure they liked what they seen tonight.”
on circumstances…
“We only can control what we do. We train well, we’ve not really trained long because we’ve been travelling quite a bit so we’ve focused more on intensity and less volume, kept them quite brief on the training ground, not long sessions, but really demanded the quality and intensity and I think at times tonight when we needed to produce that intensity and that good change of tempo in the game, we did that, but they’re fresh and I think more than anything keeping them fresh, keeping their heads on a few things with the ball and a few things without the ball, not complicating their heads too much, and I think it all came together tonight.”
