Adelaide United coach John Kosmina would have liked more goals from his side in their comprehensive victory over an insipid Sydney FC.
There was only one small thing that disappointed Adelaide United coach John Kosmina following his side’s comprehensive 3-0 New Year’s Eve dismantling of Sydney FC at Hindmarsh Stadium on Monday. He would have liked more goals.
Not that Kosmina, after a three-goal triumph, is getting greedy on the back-end of the festive season.
The fact is the Reds were so dominant and attacking over the 90 minutes, they should have won by more.
Dario Vidosic struck a first-half brace before narrowly missing a swag of second-half hat-trick opportunities, with a gettable near-miss just after resumption, a free-kick that smacked the crossbar and another attempt denied by the right upright in the dying minutes.
Strikers Evan Kostopoulos and Bruce Djite also hit the woodwork as United routinely swarmed the inexperienced and undermanned Sky Blues.
“The only thing I didn’t like about it, I suppose, is we didn’t get more goals,” Kosmina said.
“We had an opportunity to make up for the six (6-1 loss) we copped the other week (against Western Sydney) and square the ledger, at least on goal difference.
“Sydney had a young team out there, relatively inexperienced, and we could have got more out of it.
“We hit the woodwork three times so that makes (up the) six that we lost the other week.”
While a rare opportunity to really fill their boots went begging, Adelaide nevertheless recaptured some lost form and momentum with the victory.
“We kept a clean sheet and we put two halves of football together,” Kosmina said.
“The fact is we went on with the first half and created a lot of opportunities in the second.
“With any luck we could have had seven or eight or even more.”
Leading the way in attack for the Reds was red-hot Vidosic, whose two goals lifted him to a team-high eight for the season.
“Great, really good,” Kosmina said of Vidosic’s performance.
“He was really unlucky not to get a hat-trick.”
Unlike Vidosic, Djite has not quite been able to consistently get among the goal-scorers and didn’t trouble the scorers on Monday, but the talented striker was prominent in the majority of United’s forward forays.
Kosmina believes if Djite keeps up his competitive form, a bag of goals will be just around the corner.
“Bruce makes a helluva difference – he bashes up centre-halves,” Kosmina said.
“He’s probably still spitting chips at getting knocked around by Western Sydney a couple of weeks ago.
“He had a great game … he was in front of his man all night long and got into good positions.
“He needs to patient and keep doing the good things that he’s doing now and eventually the goals will start to come for him.”
The only real downer for the Reds was defender Nigel Boogaard being substituted off at the 64-minute mark with a hamstring injury.
He is in some doubt for United’s away clash with the Newcastle Jets on Saturday.
“I didn’t want Bogy to come off,” Kosmina said.
“At 2-0, the two centre backs (Boogaard and Iain Fyfe) were doing a good job … winning most of the stuff in the air.
“It just panned out that way because Bogy’s hamstring tightened up.
“We’re going to have a look at it in the next couple of days and make a decision.”
