Perth coach Dave Mitchell has denied there’s any bad blood between his captain Jacob Burns and midfielder Victor Sikora after the pair argued during the Glory’s 2-1 loss to Gold Coast United on Sunday.
Just before half-time, Burns ran over to Mitchell on the sideline asking for Sikora to be taken off after Burns was forced to mop up a mistake by the former Dutch international.
But Mitchell said Burns’ merely over-reacted to the error, saying there were no issues between the players off the pitch.
“That’s a heat of the moment scenario but nothing to do with how Victor was playing,” said Mitchell from the club’s temporary base on the Gold Coast this week, ahead of flying to Townsville to face the Fury on Saturday.
“I think it was a situation where Jacob had to make a long run because Victor let a ball run through his legs and then Jacob had to run 70 metres and he was frustrated.”
“He was just a bit annoyed (but) next time it could be Victor shouting at Jacob.”
“When someone doesn’t do something when they expect them to do it, they get on their back,” he said.
Mitchell praised Sikora’s response as the Dutchman, like many of his team-mates, produced a sizzling second half of football, with Sikora’s slide-rule pass setting up a goal for Todd Howarth, a 54th-minute equaliser that cancelled out United’s opening goal in the 13th minute.
“Victor’s a fantastic player,” said Mitchell. “(But) they’re not robots. Players can play bad, they can make mistakes.”
“But you’ve got to get the goodness out of them (and) Victor in the second half was superb, so was the team.”
Unfortunately for the Glory, a mistake in defence allowed Gold Coast hitman Shane Smeltz to re-take the lead just 11 seconds after kick-off as Perth’s Scott Neville and Jamie Coyne collided, allowing Joel Porter the simplest of crosses for Smeltz to tuck home.
But despite the lapse, the Glory kept on coming and was unlucky not to draw level as striker Branko Jelic had a penalty appeal waved away before seeing a netted equaliser in the 67th minute flagged offside.
Mitchell, though, was cautiously optimistic that marquee player Mile Sterjovski, who was a late withdrawal from Sunday’s game with a leg injury, would be fit to face North Queensland this weekend, giving the club that extra firepower it lacked on Sunday.
