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Feb 26, 2020   |  8:58AM AET

Round 21 preview: Victory v Adelaide

Round 21 preview: Victory v Adelaide

Melbourne Victory hosts Adelaide United at Marvel Stadium as it continues its Hyundai A-League season on Saturday.

Summary

Victory is bidding to make a late push for a finals spot and has back-to-back blockbuster home games against Adelaide and Sydney FC.

It heads into the meeting with the Reds on the back of a 1-1 draw against the Jets in Newcastle.

Ola Toivonen’s second-half header from Tim Hoogland’s brilliant cross earned Victory a point against the Jets.

Toivonen’s goal was his 10th of the Hyundai A-League season, backing up the 15 he scored in his maiden league campaign for Victory in 2018/19.

Victory has eight league games remaining this season, with five of those at home.

It has lost just one of its past seven home games, a run which has included wins over Perth Glory and the Jets, and Bali United and Chiangrai United in the AFC Champions League.

Leigh Broxham made his return from a calf injury against Newcastle, although the Victory stalwart was an unused substitute.

Player in focus

What they said

“We said last weekend that it was the most important game of our season and this weekend is even more important, especially because the results sort of went our way considering our result. We’ve lost to Adelaide twice this season and we’re not looking to do it a third time. Taking three points this weekend would be huge for us and it’ll help us kick on to the next few games and storm into the finals hopefully.” – Victory attacker Andrew Nabbout.

“In general it’s pretty easy to get up for your bigger games of the season and this is definitely, in terms of our fixtures, probably one of the biggest so really looking forward to it. I’ve been out for a little bit so happy to be back and hopefully we can put on a good performance first and then if you do that the result kind of takes care of itself.” – Adelaide midfielder James Troisi.

Last time

Hyundai A-League 2019/20 Round 15
Adelaide United 1-0 Melbourne Victory
Friday, January 17, 2020
Coopers Stadium, Adelaide

Only one goal separated the teams in January.

Ben Halloran scored what proved to be the winner for Adelaide just after the half-hour mark.

As it stands

Head to head

Round 15, 2019/20: Adelaide 1-0 Victory at Coopers Stadium
Round 7, 2019/20: Adelaide 3-1 Victory at Coopers Stadium
Round 26, 2018/19: Adelaide 1-0 Victory at Coopers Stadium
Round 12, 2018/19: Adelaide 2-0 Victory at Coopers Stadium
Round 7, 2018/19: Victory 2-0 Adelaide at Marvel Stadium

Match details

Melbourne Victory v Adelaide United
Marvel Stadium, Melbourne
Saturday, February 29, 2020
Kick-off: 7.30pm AEDT

Melbourne Victory squad:  4.James DONACHIE, 5.Tim HOOGLAND, 6. Leigh BROXHAM, 7.Kenny ATHIU, 8.Jakob POULSEN, 9.Andrew NABBOUT, 11.Ola TOIVONEN, 15.Giancarlo GALLIFUOCO, 16.Josh HOPE, 17.Elvis KAMSOBA, 18.Migjen BASHA, 19.Ben CARRIGAN, 20.Lawrence THOMAS (gk), 21.Adama TRAORE, 23.Marco ROJAS, 24.Anthony LESIOTIS, 25.Brandon LAUTON, 30. Matthew SUTTON, 32. So NISHIKAWA
**0-1 to be omitted**

Ins: 32. So NISHIKAWA (promoted)
Outs: NIL
Unavailable: 1.Matt ACTON (shoulder), 2.Storm ROUX (calf), 10.Robbie KRUSE (hamstring), 26.Jay BARNETT (leg)

Donachie