Brisbane Roar looked a mere shadow of their best in drawing 1-1 with the Fury on Saturday night, but coach Ange Postecoglou says his players are beyond reproach as they stumble towards the end of a gruelling stretch of football.
The Roar have played more games than any other side in the Hyundai A-League, and the testing times are set to continue as they round out yet another triple-header week with games against Perth on Wednesday and Central Coast next Saturday.
The draw with their northern neighbours was easily Brisbane’s most disjointed performance at home this season, and Postecoglou concedes they were missing their spark.
Yet, even without the fluency of football, the coach says his players are continuing to impress.
“To the boys’ credit, they tried hard, but it was really laboured tonight. We’re in the middle of a grind and we’re just getting through it.”
“You can’t question the commitment or the effort of our players, that’s for sure.”
“It’s encouraging and we’re learning some really important lessons through this tough period, and that is that we’ve lost some talented players, but we’re pretty tough mentally as a group of players as well.”
“The fact that we’re still running hard at the end of the game and trying to get a result shows where we’re at.”
“As a coach, you can’t ask any more of the players than what they’re doing at the moment. It would be unreasonable of me to expect anything more, I think they’re doing a fantastic job,” said Postecoglou.
Ivan Franjic’s 85th minute equaliser against North Queensland marked the third consecutive occasion that the Roar have been first to concede, only to claw back to defend their undefeated streak, which has now reached 12 games.
Chasing down teams who have largely been content to sit on the lead has taken plenty of petrol out of the Roar, but, while disappointed by conceding a soft early goal, Postecoglou preferred to look at the positives of his side’s proven ability to play from behind.
“There aren’t many teams in the A-League that can turn around a 1-0 deficit. If you look at the stats, most of the time the team that scores first ends up winning the game in this league.”
“The last three games, we’ve managed to get a result out of every one of them, and that’s a positive,” he said.
“I’m confident in the players’ ability to back up, and even for Wednesday night they’ll be ready to go and give it everything they’ve got against Perth.”
The Roar are likely to have their depth further tested this week, with centre-back Matt Smith, who came off before half-time against the Fury with lower-back problems, unlikely to return against the Glory on Wednesday night.
