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Don’t try to tell Central Coast Mariners coach Lawrie McKinna his team’s 3-0 win over A-League leaders Gold Coast United was an act of “giant-killing”.
Instead, McKinna feels the surprise greeting their emphatic win is simply a reflection of the lack of credit the Mariners have received since the competition began in 2005.
“We don’t usually get any credit anyway, so we just go about our business,” he said on Monday.
“What it (the win) has done is probably made a few people realise Gold Coast are beatable, that’s twice in three weeks they’ve been beaten.
“We fully believed we could win the game. We played them in a pre-season game and did very well against them and although they’re probably deserving to be top of the league, we thought they were very beatable.”
McKinna, who has coached the Mariners since the inception of the A-League, has long struggled to get his club recognised in the face of higher-profile opponents.
Despite making two grand finals in five seasons and only missing the finals once in that time, the Mariners are still considered minors in the competition, even more so with cashed-up Gold Coast and Perth flexing their financial muscle this season.
McKinna has also had to battle with a view his team’s success has been largely built on dour, long-ball football – a claim the 48-year-old Scot denies.
“I think there’s quite a few games now where people have done the stats on it and the teams we play against actually play a lot more long balls than we do,” McKinna said.
“The fact is because I speak with a Scottish accent they say that we don’t want to play football, but I actually enjoy playing football.
“Some days when you’re playing against a team who’s doing very well, you’re put under pressure and it’s very dangerous to knock the ball about.
“But at the weekend our team knocked the ball about well and did themselves proud.”
With victories over Melbourne, Perth and Gold Coast all in the bag this season, McKinna says the challenge for his men is to maintain form.
Next up is ninth-placed Wellington and then bottom side North Queensland Fury.
“I think we deserve to have a couple more points than we actually have,” McKinna said.
“We’ve got two games against two of the lower teams on the table in the next two weeks to finish the first round. They’re probably going to be our two hardest games.
“Wellington did very well against us last year, we had a poor record against Wellington. So we’ve got a real hard game this week and then obviously Fergie (Fury coach Ian Ferguson) coming back to Blue Tongue with his team after being here for so long.
“The next two games certainly aren’t any easier.”
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