Melbourne Victory continues its push for a top-four finish in the Westfield W-League when it visits Perth Glory on Tuesday.
Summary
Victory is on a five-match unbeaten run ahead of the trip to Dorrien Gardens in a clash that was pushed back from Sunday.
It is the first of two meetings between the clubs to finish the campaign, with Victory hosting Perth on March 28.
Victory has won four of its past five matches as it eyes a third straight finals appearance.
It recorded a 1-0 win over the Western Sydney Wanderers last time out thanks to a goal from Annalie Longo.
Longo volleyed in from close range late in the first half as Victory claimed another win to make it 13 points from a possible 15.
Victory was without star forward Catherine Zimmerman (Achilles) for the clash against the Wanderers, while Lia Privitelli will miss the trip to Perth after accumulating four yellow cards.
After visiting Perth, Victory will take on Sydney FC on March 20 before hosting the Glory a week later.
Head coach Jeff Hopkins’ pre-match thoughts
on preparation…
“It gave us a nice long break in between and we’ve used that quite well I think. It’s nice to get into a rhythm of train, play, train, play, but it was nice as well just to maybe do a few fixes on a few of the things that we needed to work on, got a bit of conditioning into the players’ legs as well so the players are in really good nick physically and in good spirits as well so it’s been a good 10 days.”
on run…
“We spoke about it before that over the last five games and this was the sixth game of the six that we targeted just to accumulate points and to fix a few things up every week and get a little bit better every week and we’ve definitely done that in a number of areas. We’re looking very stable at the back, very solid, the understanding between the centre-backs, the midfielders in front, the full-backs to the side is getting better and better and I think the quality of our play has gotten better and better each week so credit to the players, they’ve got their heads down and they’ve worked really hard over the last month to six weeks and kind of reaping the rewards in the games as well so I’ve been really happy with the way the players have worked, worked hard together, focused on the small areas we’ve needed to and it’s good to see them getting a bit of reward with accumulating so many points over the last five games.”
Last time
Westfield W-League 2019/20 Round 7
Perth Glory 1-2 Melbourne Victory
Saturday, December 28, 2019
Dorrien Gardens, Perth
After Crystal Thomas missed a penalty for Perth, Amy Jackson scored a brace, including a spectacular long-range effort, to put Victory ahead.
Leticia McKenna pulled a goal back for Perth in the second half, but Victory closed out its win.
As it stands
Match details
Perth Glory v Melbourne Victory
Dorrien Gardens, Perth
Tuesday, March 16, 2021
Kick-off: 9.35pm AEDT
