But the silence on the former Blackburn Rovers man is not out of impudence; United’s coach simply prefers not to single out opposition players for attention and instead has focussed the week’s training on preventing Sydney from playing as a unit.

“We haven’t mentioned Brett Emerton’s name all week at training,” Bleiberg said.

“That’s not because we mean any disrespect to Brett, on the contrary in fact. He’s had a brilliant career in the EPL and in Holland and he’s a top player who is in great shape and full of running, but the fact is that it’s not in my nature to focus on or single out one player.

“He works within the Sydney FC system so for the purposes of our preparation we will treat him the same as anyone else.”

Much like Gold Coast, Sydney have experienced an up and down start to their campaign and currently lie in sixth place, one spot below United on goal difference.

But as Bleiberg points out, more was perhaps expected of the sky blues given their off-season recruitment drive.

“They have started like we’ve started – almost identical in fact – a loss to the Roar, two draws and a win,” he said.

“The difference is in the pre-season expectation. They are a big city club with four million people and Brett Emerton; we have 400,000 people and James Brown!

“There is more pressure on Sydney again this week, especially as they are at home. We are going there to do our job and it wouldn’t matter who we were playing, we want the three points.

“We all knew we were better than our first three results suggested and last week’s win gave us some confidence and assurance that we are on the right track. I believe and the boys believe that we belong to the top half of the ladder, so we will take that mentality with us wherever we go.

“If we want to cement our place among the top five then we have to get a result in Sydney; it’s as simple as that.”

Gold Coast will again be without centre-back Ante Rozic (knee), striker Joel Porter (calf) and young full-back Josh Brillante (international duty), but welcome back rising star Ben Halloran who missed last Sunday’s win over Newcastle with foot bruising.

One or two selections are yet to be decided, but Bleiberg is likely to keep his defensive line-up unchanged from last week, meaning stalwart Kristian Rees will clock up his 100th Hyundai A-League appearance.

“Ben has come back into the squad although I’m not yet decided on how or where I will use him. We would like to have Joel and Ante available as well but overall I’m happy with the players who are available to me this week and they can do the job,” Bleiberg said.