The Brisbane Roar head south to the one venue they’ve lost at all season – AAMI Park – to play the one side to have beaten them – Melbourne Victory – and Ange Postecoglou is looking forward to the challenge of evening the score.
Melbourne Victory have just four wins for 2010-11 and haven’t been close to the form that took them to last year’s Grand Final.
The Roar have gone from strength to strength since their loss to the Victory in the early rounds of the season, and last week they turned up the heat, torching fourth-placed Central Coast 5-1.
Brisbane had their revenge over the Victory with a 2-1 win at Suncorp back in October, but Postecoglou is always looking for challenges, and says winning away from home against the Victory is one of the few that hasn’t been ticked off the list.
Earlier in the week, Archie Thompson gave Brisbane some added incentive, telling media that the Victory were on another level until the Roar actually had something in the trophy cabinet.
Postecoglou, on a Hyundai A-League-record 14-game winning streak, wasn’t too bothered by the claims, but mentioned it was nice to already be guaranteed a chance to compete for silverware this season.
“I don’t think it’s us going around and saying what we’re doing, I think it’s other people who are having a look at us and putting up that measure,” said Postecoglou
“It’s pretty hard to win anything mid-season. I don’t know what we were supposed to do. All we could do is play the football we’ve been playing and keep being as successful as we can be.”
“I think the one guarantee that we’ve got at the moment is that we’ll be playing finals football – 40 points will get you in the final – so I guess that gives us a chance to win something.”
“There’s other clubs now who will start looking at their finals prospects, and pressure starts to build now. Every result takes on more significance for everyone.”
“From our point of view, because of the position we’re in and the foundation we’ve laid, we can still concentrate on the way we’re playing, rather than the results.”
Brisbane will go into the match with an unchanged starting side from last weekend’s thumping of Central Coast, but will be without workhorse midfielder Massimo Murdocca, who is out with a slight groin strain.
National Youth League standout Luke Brattan will join with the squad and will look to show his intelligent passing game in a rare opportunity.
