Sydney FC coach John Kosmina believes his side didn’t work hard enough in its to defeat the Perth Glory on Sunday afternoon.
The Sky Blues lost 2-1 to the Perth club as Jamie Harnwell’s brace more than cancelled out Brendon Santalab’s first-half strike for the visiting New South Welshmen.
But as the mercury soared to 33 degrees at Members Equity Stadium, Kosmina felt his players didn’t put in the hard yards against a Glory side that put a tumultuous fortnight of soul searching behind it following 4-1 and 4-0 defeats to Central Coast and Melbourne respectively.
And Kosmina is all too aware sides can pay dearly for not being completely on their game after a three-match spell where Sydney has lost to the unfancied Wellington and Perth and conjured a draw with Queensland
“We defended that second goal really poorly, same as that first one,” said Kosmina following the defeat.
“We can play good football there’s no issue with that and at times we did that.”
“But sometimes you’ve just got to do the dirty work and twice we’ve been found wanting against teams that are prepared to roll the sleeves up and have a bit of a dust-up.”
“But Wellington as well did the same thing, we copped them at the end of a Spanish inquisition into the attitude and culture at the club.”
“So we’ve probably got the raw end of the stick in that regard but that’s part and parcel of professional football.”
Sydney’s lone goal scorer Santalab wasn’t exempt from criticism either, the Sydney coach saying the 26-year-old forward needed to work on his defensive pressure if he was to cement a permanent spot in the starting XI.
“Santa did well when we had the ball but he didn’t work very hard when we didn’t and there were a lot of times when he should have taken some more defensive responsibility,” Kosmina said.
“The game nowadays is not just about, you’ve got a job, you play up front, you’ve still got a defensive role and your defence starts from the front, not from the back, you can’t have people run past you.”
