Muscat said the strenuous schedule in January took its toll on his players who have now taken time to freshen up.

It will be the fourth Melbourne derby of the season so far, including City’s 2-0 FFA Cup Semi-Final win in late October.

Victory have now lost three games on the trot, but Muscat said it was down to lapses in concentration more than anything else.

“We want to group those nine days together because it’s a good reading for some and not so for others,” Muscat said.

“It was a taxing period and I’ve got to commend the group on the way they really attacked the period where we had quite a bit of travel.

“The reality is we were disadvantaged against our opponents and we were placed in that position. That’s life, we took that challenge on, move forward now.”

As Victory sit 11 points behind Sydney FC who travel take on Brisbane Roar away tonight, he simply joked rhetorically asking “who cares?”, believing it was irrelevant at this point in time.

Muscat was instead looking at the performances and believed it was not time to panic after losing three in a row.

“We’re disappointed at the last three games in nine days, it was four games in 14 days prior to that. It was a very taxing period, leading into that we were travelling very well,” he said.

“If we analyse results you’ll be disappointed but our performance in our last game against Sydney certainly warranted something and the performance in Perth before that was the same. Whilst that maintains, I’m relatively comfortable.”

And in regards the departure of Maxi Beister, Muscat said it was for the best.

He said there was no immediate rush to replace the German.

“Not at this stage, I don’t think so (replacing Beister). Unless something pops up, I wouldn’t have thought so. We’re comfortable with the squad we’ve got,” Muscat said.

“It was one of those situations, with discussions with myself and Maxi. For some personal reasons, it’s best for Maxi that he’s back home and for the football club as well.”