Western will belatedly recommence their debut A-League season this Saturday when they take on Melbourne Victory at Bankwest Stadium.

The fixture had initially been slated as the first contest that would be staged following the competition’s COVID-19-enforced suspension. However, a failed attempt to leave Victoria ahead of the closure of its border with NSW force Western, alongside Victory and Melbourne City, into a mandatory two-week quarantine and forced the game's rescheduling.

That confinement is set to end on the morning of Western and Victory’s third meeting of the season, with Rudan’s side looking to make it three wins from three games against the big dogs of the Melbourne A-League yard in their first season in the competition.

The pressure will be on Rudan and his side to get a result in the contest, with Adelaide United’s win over Brisbane seeing them vault the expansion side and occupy sixth-place on the A-League table and Newcastle Jets' 2-1 win over Sydney FC closing the gap behind them.

“That’s good, that’s what we want,” Rudan said of the tightening margin for error.

“We want good competition and we want there to be those kinds of results we saw with Newcastle, who I thought was great value and probably the best team that I’ve seen so far since the competition re-started.

“But we’ve just got to take things one game at a time. We can’t let all those other factors affect us. We know who we are, we know we are still in control of our destiny. Other teams have played more games than us. If we start thinking too much about the what-ifs we will not be in the present.

“And we’re trying to stay in the present as often as possible.”

While Western’s coming fixture against Victory carries a number of question marks given the significant upheaval that both sides have experienced in 19/20, Rudan has been doing what he can to prepare.

“We can only go by the coaching staff, we know who the coaching staff is,” he said.

“My oldest boy plays for Victory so he knows what [Victory interim-Head Coach Grant] Brebner does in his training sessions and things like that. So it’s good to get some insight.

“And there assistant coach Jeff [Hopkins], we’ve had a look at a lot of his games coaching the women’s team at Victory; looking at their set-pieces, their playing style, their formation, how they defend.

“We’re trying to cover all bases. It doesn’t really mean that’s what’s going to happen, but we’re trying to cover all the what-ifs.

“The other important part is making sure we do our job properly.”