They’re on the winning run of their lives, but Perth Glory aren’t content just yet as they gear up for an A-League blockbuster with Melbourne City.
A six-pack of wins hasn’t been enough to satisfy Perth Glory’s thirst, with Tony Popovic’s squad eager to feast on Melbourne City in Saturday night’s heavyweight clash at AAMI Park.
Glory’s fighting 1-0 victory over the Wanders last week extended their winning run to a club-record six A-League matches.
More importantly, the hot form has seen Perth rocket from last spot on the ladder into third, giving them a strong platform to launch their title assault.
A seventh straight win will see Glory leapfrog Melbourne City into second spot.
Confidence among Glory’s players is sky high, but they aren’t resting on their laurels.
“It’s obviously nice to win six games in a row, but at the end of the day we want to make it seven,” Glory midfielder Neil Kilkenny said.
“Melbourne City are slightly ahead of us, but they had a good start to the season and we’re in a good bit of form now. Hopefully we can get the three points.”
Popovic isn’t new to winning runs after he guided the Wanders to an amazing ten straight victories in their inaugural season of 2012-13.
But the master coach knows the current streak is probably something new to the majority of his current players, and he wants them to be proud of their efforts.
Glory have averaged three goals a game during their hot streak, but their performance against the Wanderers showed they can also grind out wins.
“When you win six consecutive games they’ll be won in many different ways,” Popovic said.
“The one we won on the weekend was a real team effort. The boys fought very hard, didn’t give many chances away and we found a way to win differently to what we have previously.
“We’ve done something unique for the club – winning six straight – and we’re prepared to do whatever it takes to try to keep this run going.”
Glory will again be without Juande (groin) and Osama Malik (hamstring), but Chris Ikonomidis (knee) and Ivan Franjic (calf) are chances to return.
AndyAdelaide
Roar Rookie
i don’t see glory winning the title this year, they’ll go close like last year but ultimately lose. There forward line is devastating but i still think they have issues at the back. Reddy always looks (pardon the pun) ready to make a mistake. It will be interesting if poppa signs our recently released goalkeeper (who i dont think we should’ve released) magush, poppa made a couple of inquiries last year; when we were trying to do that swap deal with wilson lol
Buddy
Roar Rookie
The focus last weekend was all on the misfortunes of WSW and Little was said about the PG performance which I thought was pretty poor overall. They were gifted the only goal of the game and Only Castro really looked like causing any damage as he ran at defenders who didn’t appear to know whether to back off or attempt to tackle. BF was all over the park As usual and always in the thick of any action, collisions and altercations. Reddy made a couple of good saves too and yes they came away with a win against a struggling side. However, another performance like that against MC this week and they could easily ship 2 or 3 goals and leave Melbourne very much second best. I hope Chris Ikonomidis is back and firing, he is capable of causing havoc and providing BF with much better service than he received last Sunday night.