Perth coach Dave Mitchell will be launching an internal review into his side’s poor start to the new Hyundai A-League season after it was comprehensively routed by the Queensland Roar on Sunday.
In a horror afternoon for a Glory side that went into the match confident of getting its first victory of the season against the previously winless Roar, Queensland produced several exhilarating counter-attacks, cutting Perth’s defence to ribbons as it earned a 3-0 win that leaves the Glory on the bottom of the Hyundai A-League table with just one point from four matches.
And, to add insult to injury, the Glory will be missing Brazilian playmaker Amaral for the next six matches after he went down with a serious hamstring injury late in the second half.
But Mitchell was more worried about his side’s defensive lapses, describing the manner in which his defence lost its concentration throughout the game as ‘soul destroying’, with the defensive performance forcing the Glory coach to instigate a major review just a month into the new campaign.
“It wasn’t good enough today,” said Mitchell following the match. “(But) they (Queensland) thoroughly deserved a win, and it was discouraging for us so we’re going to have an internal review this week and if there’s any problem there, we’re going to get it out.”
“We had runners coming from midfield (that) weren’t getting picked up. We had two defenders marking one striker, a lot of things were wrong, and once they scored the second goal, it was just a nail in the coffin.”
“(So, the review will be) a coaching/player thing, where we put everything on the table and have a look at it and see what the outcome is and if we can rectify it, we will do.”
Mitchell said he’d been happy with the Glory’s early play, where the team created several chances during the opening stages, but felt his side let the Roar back into the game when it failed to deal with a quickly taken free-kick that eventually saw Craig Moore fire in Queensland’s opening goal through a crowded penalty area.
“I think in the first 20 minutes we looked very good and then it was just a free kick, just got in behind us and we all switched off and that’s soul destroying and it took the wind out of our sails,” Mitchell said.
“I just feel that we’re not, sometimes, switched on. (With) free kicks, we take our time and we didn’t get organised and I think we’re worried about so many different other things and they’ve taken a quick one again and caught us on the hop, it’s discouraging because you talk about that before the game.”
