Kevin Muscat argued Melbourne Victory’s Round of 16 tie with Jeonbuk Motors is “still wide open” after his team were held to a 1-1 draw at home.
Victory dominated possession for large portions of Tuesday night’s match at AAMI Park but were unable to find a second goal after Leonardo’s stunning free-kick cancelled out Besart Berisha’s opener.
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While Jeonbuk will be considered strong favourites to advance next week, Victory have scored in their three other away matches in the 2016 AFC Champions League (ACL).
Muscat made it clear he is confident Victory can get a result in South Korea, although he warned his team they must be more clinical if they are to reach the ACL quarter-finals.
“We need to improve when we’ve got the ball,” he said at his post-match press conference.
“When we capitalised on situations and moved the ball quickly and played through that first press there were instances where we should have scored goals and we didn’t even get a chance out of it. That gives me great confidence.”
Muscat conceded Victory struggled with Jeonbuk’s direct play and knock-downs but indicated his team will attempt to exploit the K-League side’s weakness at set-pieces in the away leg.
Berisha’s fifth-minute goal came from a corner that was hooked back into the mix by Leigh Broxham for the marquee striker to nod into the net.
“The way they [Jeonbuk] set up zonally, we took the approach that we were more likely to score on the second phase than direct because they had superior height to us, and we were dangerous of corners, we were very dangerous,” Muscat said.
“So we’ll have a good look at that and it’s certainly an area where they’ve conceded goals as well [this season].”
Victory almost scored from two more flick-on headers from Daniel Georgievski either side of half-time.
