In front of nearly 25,000 at Etihad Stadium, Deng turned the ball into his own net in the 53rd minute after Luke Wilkshire’s cross sailed over the head of Sydney captain Alex Brosque.

The 20-year-old was back from a loan deal with Jong PSV in the Eredivisie where he made five appearances.

Muscat said the Kenyan-born player was a good investment and would only get better.

Victory were missing Mark Milligan, James Troisi and Kosta Barbarouses due to international duty.

“These circumstances give people opportunities," Muscat said, "and I thought he was excellent. 

“His performance tonight will propel him into a position where we consider playing him (again).

"He came up against a decent player in Adrian (Mierzejewski) and really held him to touches in the back third of their structure.

“As disappointed as I am, I won’t be able to point the finger for that one (own goal)."

Muscat said three years ago a mistake like that would have sent Deng "into his shell," - not anymore.

"You noticed his action immediately after (the own goal), picking up the ball and running into the other half. He showed me he'd matured a lot.

"If he keeps going like that, working the way he is going in training, we've certainly got a real serious option."
 
Muscat had indicated on Friday that Leroy George was not 100 per cent and the Dutchman only managed 65 minutes.

“Not the start in terms of the return of points but I was fairly pleased," Muscat added.

"I was disappointed for the boys - I thought we worth something tonight. Early on, at the start of the game we were controlling.

“We had three or four real good opportunities to create goal scoring chances. The final pass was a bit off.

“In the end of the game, we had a number of opportunities and chances...it was a reflection on them (Sydney) that they had to defend so desperately. It was a fair indication that we were knocking but unfortunately for us we couldn’t put them away.”