The Newcastle Jets will be trying to get themselves mentally and physically prepared for Saturday night’s Hyundai A-League clash against Brisbane at Suncorp Stadium after a hectic week of football.
A 10-man Jets outfit ran itself ragged in oppressive conditions in beating Melbourne last Sunday before putting in a below-par performance in losing 2-0 to the Gold Coast on Wednesday night.
Newcastle coach Branko Culina said the schedule had taken its toll on his team.
“It is a big ask to play Sunday, then Wednesday and Saturday. And we don’t have a lot of depth in our squad,” said Culina.
“We’ve only got a small squad so there’s not a great deal you can do other than make minor alterations, or the forced ones.”
“We’ve got a couple of possibilities but it will take more than that to get the players up for it because of the toll that the last couple of games have taken. It’s not that you can change six or seven players, if you do change, you change one or two.”
One definite change will be goalkeeper Neil Young who will need an operation to correct his nose after it was broken in a clash with Shane Smeltz on Wednesday night. But far from the physical changes, Culina believes the biggest hurdle to winning on Saturday against the Roar will be getting is players mentally prepared.
“The biggest danger is ourselves,” he said. “If we play like we did on Wednesday it doesn’t matter what Brisbane put up it’s going to be a tough one for us.”
“I’m not even concerned about Brisbane, on their day they can be a very good side and they have some very good players, but again it’s more about us being up for the game that I’m concerned about.”
“You’ve got to be honest and say that against Melbourne we were outstanding and against Gold Coast we were very ordinary. That’s why you can’t get carried away.”
“We have to learn to tough it out even when we’ve not got things going for us, that’s the question mark to see how we bounce back.”
