Perth Glory goalkeeper, Danny Vukovic, has stressed that Friday night’s game against the Central Coast Mariners at nib Stadium is a ‘huge’ game for the club.
Perth Glory goalkeeper, Danny Vukovic, has stressed that Friday night-s game against the Central Coast Mariners at nib Stadium is a ‘huge- game for the club.
The Mariners are currently first on the Hyundai A-League table entering a festive week of games.
“It-s a huge game for us,” Vukovic said.
“We haven-t been playing the best football of late and not getting the results so Friday night is a very important game for us to get our season back on track.”
It will be take-two on Friday as Perth Glory have already played Graham Arnold-s men once this season, back in Round 4. On that day, the Mariners won 2-1, however, Vukovic says the Glory can learn from the defeat.
“I think so, I feel that we could have got a lot more out of it, especially after we were 1-0 up.”
“We-ll be looking back what we did there in that first half an hour, as we played them off the park, so if we can do the same on Friday night, we-ll have a good shot.”
Vukovic, a former Mariner himself, believes Arnold has made the Mariners tough to beat. So much so, Vukovic hasn-t tasted success against his old club since he left to Turkey in 2010.
“I-ve played them two or three times since I-ve left, and every time they-ve managed to beat the side that I-m in by one goal.
“They-ve got a great coach, they-re well drilled and every player knows their roles in that team.
“Arnold gets the best out of them.
“Hopefully it-s a bit different on Friday night,” he added.
And after a week of headlines surrounding the ownership of Perth Glory, the star keeper says it hasn-t affected the players at all, reinforcing that their focus has been purely on football and getting a win against the Mariners.
“It-s been business as usual. We got in on Monday and started work for the game.
“ It-s a very important game for us and we know that our Chairman has our backing, so we-re just concentrating on the game and getting three points.”
It-s going to be a Christmas Cracker this Friday night.
Perth Glory v Central Coast Mariners.
Friday, 23 December
Kick-off 7pm
nib Stadium
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