Greenacre and goalkeeping coach Des Buckingham will take charge temporarily while the Phoenix board is in search for a new manager.

The Phoenix players engaged in their first training session under the pair in light-hearted fashion as they look to take on Central Coast Mariners in Hamilton today.

“They’ve been disappointed like everyone, it’s been our job to pick them up so we’ve done everything we can to try and get them confident again,” Greenacre said.

“We’ve got a philosophy in the way we want to play and that’s an attacking brand of football, we’ve worked hard on being a danger to a lot of teams.

“Look at the recruitment - it’s all been about attacking play and we’ll continue to do that.

“We haven’t changed anything, we have an attacking style of play we want to keep building on, goals breed confidence.”

Phoenix have already defeated the Mariners in a 2-0 away win in Canberra in Round 6, but currently sit last on the table, three points behind their opponents.

But captain, Andrew Durante, is still confident the club can contend for a top six position.

“It’s a tight league, you win a couple of games and you’re in the right areas, we’re fully focused on this game but we know we’ve got a good run of games coming up, Auckland too,” Durante said.

“The leadership group has really grabbed this and it can be a turning point in our season… they’re (Mariners) in a similar situation to us, playing well but not getting results.

“We’ve all had a look at each other and we put our hands up (saying) 'maybe we weren’t good enough and we didn’t do the things we should’ve done as well as we should’ve'.

“You’ll see a good reaction against Central Coast, the boys are fired up, kicked down a bit with where we are in the season, we’ve got to take that and use it as motivation to kick start our season.”