Queensland Roar is prepared to lose its ‘entertaining’ tag and play ugly to qualify for its first Hyundai A-League grand final.
Coach Frank Farina said the club was keen to take the next step in its development by booking a place in the season-decider. It’ll have to beat Adelaide United in the preliminary final at Hindmarsh Stadium to achieve this goal.
“I don’t care if we play absolutely crap and win. I think in general, if you are talking the A-League and the growth of the A-League, attractive football is part of it,” Farina said.
“But no club wants to be playing attractive football and losing games.”
“The argument with Queensland early on was that they played great, entertaining football but the first two years we didn’t make the playoffs.”
However if the Roar get a chance to play their natural game they will.
“We play attacking football, we play with two wingers but that’s not to say we are going to go all out,” he said.
“We are certainly not going to sit back, it’s not our style, it’s not the game we play, it’s not the game we are comfortable playing.”
The Roar knows beating the Reds won’t be an easy task. The South Australian side will be looking to lift after their poor semi-final performances against Melbourne while coach Aurelio Vidmar is keen to put his own forgettable week behind him.
United also has the wood over the Roar this season but Farina isn’t concerned.
“Our record is not too bad. We’ve been twice to Hindmarsh and won twice in my period of time at the club so the ground holds no fears for us,” he said.
“Hopefully we’ve still got that confidence to carry through from the past 10-12 weeks.”
Meanwhile Queensland goalkeeper Liam Reddy said shutting down Adelaide United’s set plays could contribute to a Roar victory.
“We have to be wary of that tomorrow, we’ll go through a video session tonight, we’ll be wary of it (their set plays) but hopefully we can deal with it,” he said.
“They are definitely going to be up for a big game tomorrow because there’s a lot riding on it. But they also probably want to prove to a lot of people that they are close group of players.”
