Hume City managed to make Victory fight for possession and took the A-League side to the very end. It was just a spot kick by Besart Berisha which separated the two at full-time.

“We always want to look for progression and tonight wasn’t enough progression from the last game, so we’ll just go back and work hard in training to try and progress for the next one,” Bozanic told FourFourTwo.

“It’s always a tough game in the cup, you can’t underestimate any team you play against, they played well and we had to fight for tonight’s win. Every competition game is important for this club, we want to win trophies and every single game is very important for the legs.”

It was also James Troisi’s debut for his second stint at Victory succeeding the No.10 jersey to Archie Thompson.

Troisi managed 70 minutes before being taken off for 16-year-old Seb Pasquali and coach Kevin Muscat deemed him as the best player in the first half.

Bozanic has vast experience playing with Troisi in past Socceroos camps, more notably at the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

Bozanic hasn’t played for Australia since the World Cup Qualfying 2-1 win against Kyrgyzstan in June last year and was excited to be reunited with Troisi.

“James has been really good, he’s started really well and we’re excited to have him here doing good stuff for the team this season,” he said.

“We’ve played together in the national team so it’s good to play together there as well with the experience.

“He did well tonight, it’s his first game for the club and he played well for his first game.”

Bozanic was looking to improve on the season ahead after finishing sixth on the A-League table.

“We were disappointed not to do better last season, we had the ACL (AFC Asian Champions League) which is obviously very hard to back up for both,” he said.

“We did well in the ACL and we want to improve, we’re just preparing the best we can for our season recruitment wise, training and playing.

“As a squad we’re just focusing on what we need to do for the first game this season and the cup.”