Melbourne Victory is intent on keeping a lid on things despite the club’s fantastic start to the season, which hit a new high on Friday night with a 5-0 win over Newcastle.
The Victory have now rattled in nine goals in two games and sit top of the table with two wins and a draw. The comparisons are starting to build between this team and the almighty Victory team of 2006-07 which swept all before it and went on to win the championship.
But coach Ernie Merrick is determined his players remain focussed on their week to week goals and said it was far too early to start thinking about regaining the title, despite such an emphatic win over last year’s champions.
“We can’t get carried away. There’s 21 rounds to determine who gets in the finals. We’ve only played three rounds. Let’s enjoy it, but let’s not get carried away as a team. We’ve got to produce that type of performance consistently,” Merrick said.
But to Merrick’s credit, he backed his players to play attacking football on Friday night, and was rewarded with one of the best wins in the club’s history.
Melbourne’s intent on playing attacking football was evident in the fact that when defender Michael Thwaite rolled his ankle and had to come off after just 21 minutes, Merrick sent on striker Archie Thompson, who then had a hand in the first three goals of the match.
“There was a temptation to bring on a midfielder, I have to say. But sometimes as a coach, you’ve just get a gut feeling and you feel ‘we can really demolish this backline’. We threw another striker into the mix and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Tonight it worked really well,” he said.
Merrick’s message of moderation in the wake of Friday’s game has filtered down through his players, with Thompson, who made his first appearance of the season on Friday, saying he would not be getting too far ahead of himself.
“I’ve been told to play it down today. I think the second year I predicted after the third round we were going to win the league and the championship. I’ve been told to watch what I say. But this squad is right up there. I haven’t played with either Fab (Ney Fabiano) or (Jose Luis) Lopez. And it just feels like I’ve been playing with the whole time the A-League’s been here,” he said.
Merrick conceded the depth the Victory have added in the off-season is one of the main reasons behind their strong start to the season.
“The recruiting’s been a big help. We’ve had the core of the team together, they really know how to play. Fabiano didn’t score tonight, but what a game he had. I think we’ve got a good balance across the field, we’ve got some great players on the bench, we’ve got some great players on the bench, we’ve got some youngsters,” he said.
“I feel with the stability of the club, we’ve added players, we’ve added quality, and we’ve built on what was a very sound base.”
