Perth coach Dave Mitchell believes his side’s chances of making the final four hinge on beating Melbourne next week after a last-gasp equaliser from Mariner Sasho Petrovski denied the Glory an invaluable home victory.
After going behind to Mile Jedinak’s 30th-minute free kick, the Glory dominated the second half of Saturday’s clash at Members Equity Stadium, forging ahead through Nikita Rukavytsya’s brace.
But the Perth striker’s inability to prod home his third from centimetres out came back to haunt the Glory as it gave up possession during extra time and allowed Petrovski to fire in the equaliser for a 2-2 draw.
Mitchell said conceding the late goal was a sign of inexperience, saying his players seemed to have learned little after giving away a similar injury-time goal in a 3-3 draw with Newcastle during round two.
But the result could have dire implications for Perth’s finals chances, as it’s now in seventh position on the competition table, six points adrift of fourth with just eight matches remaining.
“It’s disappointing but it’s happened again,” Mitchell said.
“It’s not the first time this season and it’s happened last season as well.”
“It’s just something we’ve got to rectify and if we don’t, we deserve to be where we are.”
“I think there’s a little bit of inexperience in some cases with some players and you know they’ve got to learn and if they don’t, we won’t get anywhere,” he said, pointing out a quickly taken free kick by Adrian Trinidad as one example of this inexperience, for holding the ball up would have denied the Mariners precious time.
Mitchell also refused to accept the players thinking Petrovski was offside as an excuse.
“They thought it was ’cause there was a few hands gone up, but again I think it was they allowed the ball to get played along and there wasn’t enough pressure on the ball,” he said.
“It was a misheader by Dino (Djulibic) and a miskick by (Mariner Dylan) Macallister and then the boy’s (Petrovski) put it in, so it’s just sort of gut-wrenching really.”
“(We’re) playing Melbourne next week, best team in the competition. We have to get the win and if we don’t, then the season’s over.”
