Newcastle coach Gary van Egmond has called Friday night’s frustrating 1-1 draw with the Gold Coast as the kick in the pants his side needed before taking on Brisbane next weekend.
The Jets seemed lacklustre across the park and were almost complacent as they passed the ball around without creating any clear cut chances on goal.
They dominated possession and territory but fell behind to a goal on the counter to Daniel Bowles in the 24th minute and were unable to get an equaliser until the final seconds of the contest when defender Nikolai Topor-Stanley snuck in behind the gutsy Gold Coast defence to head home an Ali Abbas free-kick.
“It was poor in that first half in regards to our decision making as far as our position was concerned,” a frustrated van Egmond said after the match.
“We will pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and get ready for Brisbane.”
“Everyone knows that it won’t be an easy game this might be the kick in the backside that everyone needs prior to a game like Brisbane.”
The draw pushes Newcastle into fifth spot on 35 points but it leaves the door open for their competitors to close in. They are just one point ahead of the Melbourne Heart in sixth and four in front of Sydney FC with the rest of the round remaining.
And it virtually ends Newcastle’s chance at sneaking into the top four to snatch a home semi-final.
“We have to ensure that at home we take maximum points. We didn’t do that tonight,” he said.
“It is still in our own hands, by the end of the weekend we will still be in the top six and it just depends on how other results in regards to closeness in regards to a Melbourne Victory, or Sydney and how Heart goes.”
“For us it is waiting to see how that goes there.”
At the end of the season the draw will read as a fair result but one of the major frustrations for van Egmond was the fact that he had spoken all week about how the Gold coast would attack on the counter and how his side needed to be aware of the quick break.
“It is disappointing when you identify the areas where things might happen but it is not just down to one person,” he said.
“And it is not just down to one instance because there were a number of times where we rode our luck and it could have been a couple of instance. From that point of view it was disappointing.”
“But on the flipside it was it was good to see that we managed to get something out of the game which could be vitally important for us as far as that point is concerned.”
“We knew we were going to control the mainstay of the game and we had to be the ones who created the opportunities in regards to the front third.”
“A number of opportunities were going to be presented and how we get those goal-scoring opportunities to come our way.”
“That was probably the most disappointing fact that there were not that many clear cut chances from the amount of possession that we had in the opposition half.”
