Central Coast Mariners coach Graham Arnold slammed his side’s performance in their 2-1 loss to lowly Perth Glory on Saturday.
Central Coast Mariners coach Graham Arnold slammed his side’s performance in their 2-1 loss to lowly Perth Glory on Saturday.
Despite going a goal up against the league’s bottom side, the Mariners failed to take their chances to close out the game and were made to pay as Travis Dodd and Shane Smeltz cancelled out Bernie Ibini’s opener.
“We were totally out enthused and we were second to everything tonight,” he said.
“I thought for the first 15 minutes we were good; we scored the goal, we could’ve gone and got another one for 2-0 but it didn’t happen, and from then on it was all Perth Glory.
“Let’s not take credit away from Perth, they were very good tonight and I congratulate them on their performance, but we were definitely second best.”
Arnold also said that he had expected the home side to be a bit more fired up with a new coach in place.
“You could see tonight that they were up for it big time and we tried to prepare the boys for that but again we just weren’t good enough,” he said.
“If you have four or five players that had an off night, in this league you get punished for it. We got punished for it and got the kick up the backside hopefully we need.”
Even though a number of players put in a poor showing at nib Stadium, Arnold won’t be wielding the axe any time soon.
“You don’t punish people for a one off performance, you expect a reaction next week,” he said.
“We only got beat two one, we had the chances but we didn’t put them away. In some ways getting the early goal probably added a little bit of complacency and I hate that type of thing.”
The defeat leaves Central Coast just one point ahead of the Western Sydney Wanderers at the top of the table, and two sides go head to head in Gosford on March 2.
“There will be a lot of twists and turns between now and the end of the season,” said Arnold.
“We’ve done exceptionally well to be where we are and we-ve still got our own destiny in our own hands.”
Four of the Mariners’ last six fixtures are at Bluetongue Stadium, a venue where there have won eight and drawn one from nine games so far.
