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Super Sunday showdown

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Perth Glory coach Ian Ferguson is sweating on the fitness of key defender Bas van den Brink as his side prepares to take on Melbourne Victory and a resurgent Harry Kewell this Sunday at nib Stadium.

Perth Glory coach Ian Ferguson is sweating on the fitness of key defender Bas van den Brink as his side prepares to take on Melbourne Victory and a resurgent Harry Kewell this Sunday at nib Stadium.

In Perth’s biggest match this season, the fifth-placed Glory are looking to consolidate their position in the competition’s top six as the Victory, under new coach Jim Magilton, threaten from seventh.

Although they only managed a 1-1 draw with Adelaide last weekend, Victory produced several fine passages of attacking football and could have scored many more goals as Harry Kewell teamed up nicely with Archie Thompson and Danny Allsopp.

And, while Allsopp may be dropped for his missed chances, Glory coach Ferguson is especially wary of taking on Victory without key defender van den Brink, who was forced out of their 1-1 draw with Sydney midweek with a corked thigh.

“We’re obviously still waiting on Bas van den Brink, hopefully he’ll train tomorrow,” said Ferguson on Friday.

“We’ll have a better idea obviously when he lines up for training tomorrow, but it looks pretty good, it looks pretty positive at this moment in time.”

“We’ll get him warmed up before we go out and if he can come through that he’ll obviously join in training.”

Van den Brink is desperately needed as Perth are running out of defenders after Josh Mitchell also suffered bruising to the knee, while Chris Coyne (Achilles) and Scott Neville (knee) have longer-term injuries.

And, to add insult to injury, Glory injury replacement defender, Dean Heffernan, has injured the medial ligament on his knee, just three days after the Hyundai A-League’s official January transfer window opened and made him eligible to play.

Ferguson, though, said he’s still confident his players can contain Kewell and Thompson after seeing his team go unbeaten in their last five games.

“He’s (Kewell) on form at the moment,” Ferguson said.

“We watched him against Adelaide and he floats from left to right as well, so you know he causes a few problems.”

“But hopefully we don’t worry too much over the other team … hopefully we can try and get the three points and go forward and cause them problems rather than us worrying about one player.”

By the time the match begins, it will be the third match in eight days for Ferguson’s side, who, he says, are feeling the pinch of playing four of their last five games away from home.

“It has been a long trip and it’s an unusual trip that we’ve had to do,” Ferguson said.

“We’ve done it, we’ve come back with some points in the bag which is great and I think that will give the boys the lift that they need and the energy to try and get through this last push before we begin a normal season again.”

“We know it’s going to be a tough game but everyone who’s out there, I’m sure they’ll give us everything they’ve got.”

“It’s a six pointer basically,” he added.

“If we can get some daylight in between us and Melbourne, that’s what’s at stake.”

“So we’re at home, we’ve been away, we’ve travelled away we’ve come back with some great results, now we’ve got to back it up at home.”