Melbourne Victory coach Kevin Muscat believes the lessons learnt from the club’s last outing against Perth Glory will give it confidence in tomorrow’s Round 12 match at AAMI Park.
Victory lost to Glory 1-0 in a midweek fixture on December 16, despite enjoying 72 per cent possession and creating a number of goal-scoring chances.
“It was a difficult night to comprehend how we came away from there without anything,” Muscat told the media on Saturday.
“But we learned some lessons that night in terms of our own performance as well.
“That was a point where we felt we were being too safe. We were a little bit apprehensive in going forward and taking risks.
“We corrected that last week. It will be more of the same – a really upbeat performance, a real positive attack-minded performance and we look forward to reaping the rewards from it.”
Muscat said the mood among the playing group remains positive, despite the team’s recent run of losses.
“It’s my responsibility to analyse the performance and relay that to the group, make sure they understand and therefore retain belief,” he said.
“This is a tough time, but this is the period where you start finding out about characters. It’s great when you are walking around town and everyone is patting you on the back and you have collectively got one big smile on your face.
“Now is the time where it’s not about dragging your feet around the place. Now you have to be upbeat. There is only one way to get out of it, you have to maintain what we are doing with belief and work pretty hard.
“No doubt there has to be some change and the change has to be results, but in terms of what we’re trying to do, we’re going to persist and it’s something that’s brought us rewards in the very recent past.”
Victory is only expecting to be without midfielder Rashid Mahazi for one week, as he recovers from a leg injury.
