Adelaide open their campaign tonight against much fancied Perth Glory at Hindmarsh Stadium.

The Reds play five of their first seven matches at home and Vidmar recognises the importance of clocking up as many points as possible.

"It's extremely important that we start off well," he said. "We've got five of the first seven at home and at the back end it's five of the last seven away. Our home form has always been very good so we want to make sure we keep that in tact.

 "The week's training sessions have been really upbeat - spot on actually."

Of The Reds' off season signings, all bar defender Mark Rudan and striker Lloyd Owusu have been named in an extended squad with Rudan unavailable as he returns to Sydney to prepare his move to Adelaide, while Owusu is not being risked despite making quicker than expected progress following his bout of swine flu and pneumonia.

Young goalkeeper Mark Birighitti is also unavailable due to international duty with the Australian Under 19 squad and MetroStars keeper Daniel Godly has been brought in as back up to Eugene Galekovic.

Reds captain Travis Dodd has enjoyed recent meetings with Glory with the attacking midfielder scoring three times in his last four appearances against Perth in the A-League, including the winner in the last season's round one fixture.

Perth have been one of the busiest clubs in the off season, having turned over 13 players from their squad last season, and signing some big names, including Socceroo trio Jacob Burns, Chris Coyne and Mile Sterjovski, plus former Derby County defender Andy Todd in an attempt to reach the finals for the first time.

With the injection of big name signings, there will be pressure on Perth to perform, and Vidmar knows his team faces an extremely tough first up test.

He added: "It's certainly going to be a challenge. They've certainly strengthened their squad and they've got a number of experienced campaigners so it's going to be tough. We've always had it tough against Perth, we know what their strengths are going to be, but going into the first round it's a bit like going into the unknown with the different types of players that are in their team now.

 "It will be tough but we're at Hindmarsh Stadium, and it has been a great place for the Adelaide United Football Club in terms of winning games and the amount of games that we've won here, so we want to start off on a winning note."