Western United Head Coach Mark Rudan says his side is set to go "all out" as they seek to pile on Perth Glory's pain when the two sides meet on Wednesday night.
Since entering into a NSW-based hub to complete their season, Glory has slumped in form, suffering four defeats while logging just a single victory in an unconvincing 1-0 win over wooden spooners Central Coast Mariners.
With just a point needed in their last hit out to secure themselves finals football, Tony Popovic’s side instead failed to register a single shot on target as they crashed to a 4-0 defeat against a previously-tail spinning Melbourne Victory. Combined with previous defeats against Adelaide United and Wellington Phoenix, it means Glory have conceded 12 goals in their past four fixtures – a stat previously unthinkable for a side managed by Tony Popovic.
Though it wouldn’t be described as odds on, a scenario now exists where a defeat against Western on Wednesday night could see last year’s Premiers fall out of the top six come the end of the season.
And Rudan is chomping at the bit to ensure his side plays their role in bringing that scenario to life.
“We’ve seen a lot of areas we think we can expose,” Rudan told journalists on Tuesday.
“Nothing’s going to change in our side. If you look at the last five games we’re the form team of the competition: we’ve won four out of five and in three of those games we’ve scored five or more goals – which tells you what kind of a team we are.
“We’re going to go and attack, we’re going to go all out, go out and press them as well. That’s how we want to play.
“It’s an important game, but we’ve got a lot of confidence, a lot of self-belief as well, and we’re just going to go for it. If we do end up conceding a goal we’ll make sure we score more – it’s just how we are.
“You have to be wary of the opposition and respect the opposition, but we’re not going to change at all and we’re going to go out and play our normal attacking game.
“It’s unlike Popa’s [Popovic] teams to [conceded so many], but knowing Popa he’ll be working hard to rectify that. We’ve seen a lot of the way they play, not too dissimilar to us, they’ve got a clear style of play and we’re looking to stop them from playing and obviously expose areas that we’ve analysed as well.”
Should Western succeed in inflicting further pain on Glory, however, Rudan acknowledged his side will need to cut down on the mental errors and gaps in concentration that have begun to seep into their game that, in part, allowed Western Sydney Wanderers to erase a three-goal deficit in Friday evening’s 5-3 win.
“I was disappointed, I won’t lie,” Rudan reflected. “When you’re leading 3-0 and you give up three goals it’s a hard pill to swallow. I certainly was not happy and even afterwards, it took me a while for it to sink in that we won the game because I was still a little bit angry about that situation.
“But we discussed it, I kept the message positive afterwards and the courage shown at 3-3 to get back and win the game because, as I said post-game, many teams wouldn’t have been able to do that and I’ve seen a lot of examples of that around the world.
“I’ve spoken to the players that it’s about being focused and keeping concentration at every moment – every action is important. These are the moments and it’s not like we don’t work on them.
“The Melbourne Victory goal [Western conceded] was a set-piece and there were 17 seconds to allow us to get ready and set up properly to defend that corner. That’s a lot of time. All the players thought it was only about five seconds but when we showed it back to them it was a lot longer than that. Against Wanderers, the first goal was not defending a cross.
“I’ve also got to assess myself and reflect on myself first and foremost, because I made two changes in the backline, taking [Josh] Risdon and [Andrew] Durante off, and though it wasn’t a completely new backline, the positional roles where different; [Aaron] Calver went from the left to the right, Tomoki [Imai] went from right-centre back to right back.
“When you change, the bearings are a bit different, so I’ve also got to be a bit better on reflection. It’s one thing making changes in the backline, but it’s also changing them positionally that probably made a difference.”
Rudan indicated that, despite being an early substitute against Western Sydney after experiencing soreness, Andrew Durante had recovered well and would be available should the Western gaffer call upon him.
Seb Pasquali, having been rested against Western Sydney, will also be available should he be called upon.
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