As the Olyroo youngster waits to hear his fate from the FFA after being red-carded for connecting with referee Mark Shield, his coach doesn’t believe the player should be banished from the game he loves.

McKinna, who initially thought Vukovic had been sent off for talking out of turn, also feels it is pointless to dwell endlessly on Sunday’s disappointment.

His focus is now on building a side which will hopefully make it third time lucky in next season’s grand final.

The Bluetongue boss said: “His main focus was we’d have been into extra time with 10 men.

"I saw Danny go up to the referee after the game but at that time I was thinking he’d been sent off for saying something or swearing.

"Danny’s disappointed first about the red card, letting his team down and letting his club down in a grand final.

“Danny trains and plays with his heart on his sleeve, he’s an emotional boy. He’s been fantastic for us for two and a half seasons.

"He’s an outstanding young guy. He’s probably the Central Coast’s favourite player just with the amount of work he does in the community.

"He puts a lot into his game, a lot into the community. He’s a good ambassador for the club.”

McKinna just hopes the dust will be allowed to settle on the incident.

He said: “I’m sure the FFA will go through the right process, so will our club and look at it in a sensible way and not rush into it.”

Vukovic’s anger was fuelled by the referee refusing to award a penalty after a clear handball by the Jets’ James Holland in the dying seconds.

While the Mariners boss knows it is no good bemoaning what might have been, he agrees it does open up the debate on technology once again.

He said: “As I said in the press conference after the game, I don’t need to saying anything about that (the handball) because the media’s done it for me.

"I was more disappointed at how we played. We didn’t play that well. If we’d played our game we’d have won the game and it wouldn’t have come to that (the handball incident).

“But the result’s finished, nothing’s going to change that so we’ll move on and look to build a team for next year to hopefully make it one out of three grand finals.”

That’s not to say McKinna would have objected to the officials taking a look in the immediate aftermath.

He said: “I’ve been a strong advocate for that all along. If the technology’s there let’s use it.

"I know they’re going to use it for the ball over the line and I’m sure down the track they’ll look at it. All the other sports do it. It only takes a matter of seconds.”

The Mariners boss didn’t get much sleep on Sunday night. A post-final club function was followed by a meeting today in Sydney to discuss the future development of the game in Australia.

McKinna and four fellow Hyundai A-League bosses met with FFA technical director Rob Baan, members of the FFA’S High Performance Unit as well as state federation coaches and the AIS.

They gathered to discuss a variety of topics including the National Football Development Plan integration, National Youth League, sports science and medical co-ordination and an AIS update.

He told au.fourfourtwo.com: “it’s been a long day especially after a disappointing night.

"I had a few hours sleep and then a nice quiet drive down here this morning. Nobody phoned me so I was left alone.”

And don’t expect the coach to be rushing out to buy the grand final DVD when it hits the shops.

He said: “It’s the same as the first year we reached the grand final. I never watched the game for about three or four months and I’ll probably do the same again.”