Melbourne Victory coach Kevin Muscat believes his side’s 1-0 win over Sydney FC last night was thoroughly deserved despite an own goal the only difference on the scorecard.
Sydney played what is fast becoming their typical style of football; sit back and waiting to hit the opposition on the counter attack. The Sky Blues created few chances and only had a a handful of real shots of anger at the Victory goal.
On the contrary, it was evident Melbourne were playing their possession game in controlling the ball and the Victory boss thought they were rewarded for effort when Matt Jurman put the ball into the back of his own net.
“Ultimately there was one team trying to win and trying not to lose and that’s no disrespect, it’s a clear fact,” Muscat said.
“There’s many ways to play the game and we were obviously trying to win, I thought Sydney came prepared to try not to lose, so in the end, of course it was justice.
“I thought the three points without doubt should have been ours.”
Victory held an average of 60 percent possession throughout the game and broke the Sydney defence down time and time again in the second half.
Despite Sydney playing counter-attacking football Muscat stressed that this game was still a big challenge to get three points out of, despite the lack of pressure put on the defenders.
“I thought we got in behind and we had a number of chances, we can hide behind stats or make ourselves look good with stats as well, don’t be fooled by the number of shots on target,” he said.
“It’s difficult to break a team down when there are a lot of bodies behind the ball, when those games occur like tonight, you’re not going to get seven or eight clear cut chances.
“On the night we created enough chances to win the game, I don’t think we were threatened going the other way.
“We had to defend a lot of long throws and free kicks, whenever they got a free kick they put the ball down and put it into our box, we had to fight and we had to match them in that contest.
“I’m not saying there’s a right or wrong, the beauty is in the eye of the beholder, there’s a reason why 30000 people turn up here tonight to watch us play.”
Melbourne Victory climb to fourth place after their win against Sydney and have a meeting with Perth Glory at NIB Stadium next Saturday.
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