In-form goalkeeper Paul Izzo says there’s no panic in the Adelaide United ranks ahead of their clash with unbeaten Newcastle Jets, despite back-to-back losses in the Hyundai A-League.
After going unbeaten over the first three rounds – and making the Westfield FFA Cup final – things have turned for Marco Kurz’s side.
There’s been injuries to key players like Johan Absalonsen, Vince Lia and Ersan Gulum, while they’ve failed to score in defeats to Melbourne City and Perth Glory.
“We can say we didn’t play too well this past week and the week before,” Izzo said.
“But at the end of the day we still leave the games with confidence because we are doing some very good things and the season is very long, and it’s very early in to it.
“We are not stressing too much and we are fully focused.
“To win games we need to score goals and we didn’t,” the gloveman added.
“At the end of the day it’s a full team performance and we can’t put the blame on anyone we all lose together and we all win together.
“And it just comes down to the preparation this week, if we do it well then we can get a good result against a Newcastle.”
But it won’t be easy with the Jets riding high in third spot on the Hyundai A-League ladder and coming off a 3-0 demolition of Wellington Phoenix.
Ernie Merrick’s men have scored a league-high 13 goals, led by a rampant attack of Roy O’Donovan, Andrew Nabbout and Dimitri Petratos.
“We’ll analyse their big guns, their front three or front four is very dangerous,” Izzo said of the Jets.
“We’ll study them and I’m sure they’ll study us and at the end of the day whoever doesn’t concede first is going to be the winner of this game.
“I knew they were going to be a strong side due to how well they recruited, unfortunately for them they had a horror injury to one of their marquee boys (Ronald Vargas).
“That’s never too good to see, but they still have a lot of strength in their squad and we are well aware of that.”
Adelaide hosts the Jets at Coopers Stadium on Saturday, with kick-off at 5.35pm (AEDT).
